


The Ghost and Mr. Edelstein

by RIC (prussia)



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Alternate Universe - Ghosts, Alternate Universe - Human, Bittersweet, Drama, Haunted House, Humor, M/M, Novella, Paranormal, Romance, Tragedy/Comedy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-12
Updated: 2016-07-08
Packaged: 2018-05-13 19:21:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 24
Words: 61,315
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5714158
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/prussia/pseuds/RIC
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In a post-WWII country, a man tours a home: haunted by its former owner. </p><p>Despite several warnings, he rushes to purchase the lakeside residence. </p><p>After all, why fear a late soldier?</p><p>The ghost of Captain Beilschmidt is hardly a threat...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by one of my favorite films of all time, THE GHOST AND MRS. MUIR. 
> 
> Adapted from a novel (I've yet to read, but now I hope to someday!) by Irish author R. A. Dick, and later made into a television series (I've never seen, but I don't think I'm missing anything), the movie was released in 1947.
> 
> It's the story of a widow who falls in love with the ghost of a sea captain. 
> 
> In my version, a violinist is paired up with the ghost of a war captain!
> 
> \-- Or a Hauptmann, but you know...I wanted to call him Captain Beilschmidt in honor of Captain Gregg.
> 
> First three chapters of this fic were written in May 2015, then I abandoned it, and picked it back up in November 2015, finally finishing it on January 12th, 2016.
> 
> This story takes place in the mid-1950s.
> 
> PruAus is the main ship, and in a way, it's the only 'real' ship. Past-tense GerIta is present, however, and unless I toss it out while editing, there's also a brief mention of Spamano, but it's rather vague.
> 
> For once, I didn’t write Austria as a man with multiple former marriages; in this story, he has never been married, thus he’s not divorced. It was fun making him more innocent, or at least less experienced in reference to love. -- Otherwise, he and Prussia are based on canon and written 'in character' as much as I normally write them.
> 
> This fic contains large amounts of symbolism and imagery and allusions to death, God, the afterlife, etc.
> 
> And for the record, I’m agnostic, and despite growing up in church, I'm not very religious, but I still love the beauty in it all: the possibility or at least the ‘idea’ of Heaven and Hell, ‘Is anyone up there watching over us?’, what happens when we finally ‘go’, _for in that sleep of death what dreams may come_ , and so on and so forth.
> 
> \-- Bottom Line: Death is a prevalent theme. (Yet there’s comedy! Oh boy.)
> 
> APH Germany and APH Fritz are also in this story...sort of.
> 
> APH Italy plays an active/significant role.
> 
> Trigger Warning: Not only do I wax poetic about death, there’s also some talk of suicide, but it’s written in a hopeful context. In other words, it’s not overly-graphic, nor ‘angst for the sake of angst’. More like suicidal ideation, from which I suffer. So it's a temptation, and not a case of a character actually going through with anything.
> 
> This story is a novella; an estimated twenty-four chapters in length, and I promise to post it all. (Anyone reading my other big fics: I do plan on returning to 'the prison story' next, and eventually 'Fritz and Grimm', which is a total bastard -- the longest novel I’ve ever written, so it needs the most editing -- but yes, surely someday I'll finish posting them both.)
> 
> Thank you so much for reading this! I'll be quiet in the remaining notes...
> 
> One quick aside, though: A few years ago, I was sitting on a boat dock, with pen in hand and paper on my lap. An old man approached me, and asked, "Are you drawing the lake?" I always thought that was cute; drawing the lake, like drawing a bath! ~ Anyway, I said, "No, sir, I'm writing a poem." ~ Well, he stood a while, telling me about the lake, and how it was created from seven creeks. I found it pretty fascinating, and knew sooner or later, I'd include it in my prose. 
> 
> ***
> 
> Again, thank you for being here, and if you read this whole story, I do hope you enjoy it!

He wandered the halls, pacing the wood floors of his once well-lit home.

He died eleven years ago tonight, and every night, at the same time, he'd return, and pace. Wandering aimless, and in quiet. He'd check to see if anyone had moved into his home.

The empty space. The dreary rooms, and the furniture in desperate need of dusting. Every decoration; every personal item and effect, still in its place.

He dreamt of a family moving into his home. Of a happy mother and father, and children to fill the rooms with laughter.

'Of all the stupid things,' he thought.

As if anyone could be happy in a haunted home.

***

'As if anyone would want to raise a family here,' the real estate agents often remarked of the unsalable home located in a part of town with few other houses. Vines climbing the brick and stone. A long fence to separate the near-vacant neighborhood from a patch of woods and the shore of a small lake. Man-made, by digging the edges of seven creeks long and deep enough until they broke their walls of mud and clay, to bleed together into one singular entity.

Responsible for selling the property, the real estate agents showed little effort in making that sale. They refused to let eager families tour the home.

'Too strange,' the agents would comment. 'Too drafty, too...gloomy,' they'd correct their explanation so the families would feel further discouraged. 'You wouldn't want your children to catch their death of cold, now would you?'

And mothers would huff, and shake their heads. 'Of course not!' they'd blurt.

And what mother in her right mind would?

Only a decade had passed since the Second World War -- and hopefully the last: the understatement of the Twentieth Century -- and no mother or father in any sort of mindset would wish death upon the children fortunate enough to have survived. To have made it through the bombings, and pillages, and 'train-rides'; to have eluded prison camps and death camps; ovens, and firing squads.

A bleak row of years and it would never grow dim, even when the future rendered it a distant past. Yet now, with only a decade behind them, the wounds were still fresh, and the streets still battered in certain parts of town. In certain capitals. In certain countries.

A man by the name of Edelstein returned to one now; to the country of his grandfather’s birth.

And he returned to find what few friends he had before the war, either dead in their graves -- personal, mass, unmarked, or otherwise -- or alive but in poverty.

Living in filth, but at least not in sin.

What few surviving acquaintances he had before the war, were now married, and many had kids. A baby boom on its way, and what else were quiet evenings good for?

Roderich Edelstein wouldn't know. He hadn't a clue. A confirmed old bachelor, though he wasn't old in age. Only in feeling; in spirit. A reclusive musician who had failed to ever marry and would never have kids.

So what did he care if the house on the corner of Lakeside and Vine was haunted?

Two streets intersecting, and one was a dead end.

Marked by an ominous sign which read the truth to anyone's life. Punctuating a lifespan with two words written in bold black print. Prior to 'end' were four little letters, and they were once pronounced over the body of the man who occupied that house. The yellow two-story dwelling, with a front porch, and a green roof which leaked, but only in the worst of storms. A bit shabby on the outside, but the inside well-kept, at least until the death of its former owner.

A Mr. Beilschmidt. -- Captain Beilschmidt.

German Military Man.

The name etched on a tombstone somewhere miles from the town. And it wasn't so much a tombstone in the traditional sense. More of a makeshift wooden cross. Two sticks tied together with fishing line...or so it appeared.

And although the name was said aloud by a soldier who adored him, no one wept for Captain Beilschmidt.

Why should they? The man was dead, and the war had raged on.

A ghost now. The war, that is.

A bad memory.

A nightmare.

And a chapter in a history book would someday speak of it to future generations, so they could learn, and not repeat the mistakes made by nations who got greedy. Wanting a larger world. A larger country. Digging creeks to form a singular body of water?

Nothing as simple. -- Twice as ambitious.

Though many were only taking orders, or giving the ones they were forced to give.

And Captain Beilschmidt was a good man before the war.

A strong man who never wasted time pacing the floors of his home until after he was dead.

***

The front door of the house was unlocked by a young real estate agent dressed in the best suit his mother could find in the back of her late husband's closet. A pin-striped vest, and a white carnation pinned to his lapel.

"Right this way, Mr. Edelstein," the agent said.

And the young man pushed open the front door and held it ajar with a wet gloved hand. "To think I could squeeze you in on such a busy day," he remarked. "Right before the holiday."

"Little reason to celebrate," replied Mr. Edelstein. A brunette all dressed in white. A smart suit, and a silk violet tie. Like something from a stage where an orchestra plays, and the audience throws roses to the handsome man who had led the whole show.

Crossing the threshold with his arm extended, Edelstein shook a dark umbrella, leaving a trail of water in his wake. "I don't like the location, I'll admit," he commented, while staring into the darkness of the hallway ahead. "I suppose you'll think it silly of me, but..." and he reverted to a whisper to impart the remainder of his statement; as if confessing a crime or a sin, "I'm afraid of water," he said.

"Ah, the lake, you mean?" the agent asked. And he leaned over, careful of the now slippery floor, in order to give an upward slap to a light switch. "It's still a good half-mile from here," the agent said, and with the swish of his wrist, the light switch clicked into place, and the overhead fixture illuminated the walkway of the front entrance.

A still rather drab foyer presented itself to Edelstein, who had spent the past several years living in hiding. In a lavish place, in a remote and undisclosed location. Undisclosed to his former friends -- the few he had -- and unknown to his surviving family. A word no longer suited to describe them.

'Surviving', that is.

And as Edelstein peered about the foyer, he sniffed and nearly sneezed, due to the dust. "Well that's a relief, anyhow," he said in reference to the lake. "I'm afraid I won't have time for long walks or Sunday drives, so I guess I won't ever see it," and with a snide smile, he added, "lucky me."

The agent shut the door behind himself, and lingered a moment, stuck between wanting to make the sale and not wanting to venture further inside the house.

"Lucky you," the agent repeated. And he and Mr. Edelstein seemed to be speaking in riddles. Perhaps by repeating the phrase, the agent was asking for an explanation...never receiving one, he crossed his heart à la a Catholic, and took a deep breath. Surely bracing himself, for he managed to move a single inch towards joining the prospective buyer, but stopped dead in his tracks the second a 'shot' rang out.

It was only Edelstein's umbrella: tossed aside; its metal handle hitting the woodwork of the house with an awful clatter.

Despite witnessing the act, the agent gasped, then backtracked the single inch. Thus he was right back where he started! No closer to giving a proper tour to the proper man who had already reached the stairwell banister.

"Are the bedrooms up there?" Edelstein asked.

"Yes, sir," said the agent upon clearing his throat, and hoped he wasn't out of line by calling the dignified man 'sir'. Based on Edelstein's appearance, ‘sir’ sounded most befitting. Yet the age gap between the agent and the man now eyeing the foot of the stairs was only a few years, he guessed. "A master bedroom and two extra," the agent clarified.

"Two," echoed Edelstein, and added a, "Hmm," before embarking on a trek to see for himself. Yet halfway up the flight of steps, Edelstein paused to ask, "Why did he need two extra bedrooms if he was a single man?"

"Um," the agent stammered, looking about the foyer, casting his wide-eyed gaze to the ceiling of all places. "I suppose...for guests??" the agent concluded. "You know," and he forced a laugh; his voice uneasy, and with a hint of it struggling not to break into a whimper, "for when his family visited??"

"But I heard this Captain Beilschmidt had no family. Only a brother, if I recall correctly."

And tired of waiting for the agent to quit wringing his hands and taking baby steps, Edelstein grabbed tight to the dust-covered banister, and finished making his way upstairs.

Huffing as he reached the narrow landing...the voice of the agent soon met Edelstein's ears.

"I didn't realize you knew about the home's former occupant," the agent called up to the man who was now easing his way down a slender hall.

Edelstein, peering at a lone circular window which punctuated the corridor. Staring at shut doors, and he was greeted by the sound of a couple of squeaky floorboards.

"Oh, stop complaining," Edelstein spoke to the wood planks beneath him.

"Do you always speak to inanimate objects?" a voice came from behind the last shut door.

The end of the hallway; the room nearest to the lone window, and outside, a storm was beginning to form, where once fell only soft rain.

The eve of a holiday, and most the town was either dead, gone away, or awaiting the dawn of a new year.

A December afternoon, and Christmas but a memory.

"Well, if it isn't Captain Beilschmidt," Edelstein said, and his words were near devoid of breath or sound. Scoffing at the thought, yet his heart raced, for the fact he stood in the presence of a ghost -- the real thing! -- was at least evident now, thanks to the disembodied comment.

To be fair, Edelstein had sensed the presence since first arriving at the house. Something unnatural in the way he felt drawn to the stairs; forgoing a full tour of the first floor; only wanting to climb until he found something more tangible than the chill in the air, and the eerie feeling you're being watched; as if the walls are made of mirrors, and the eyes of your reflection fail to blink in time with your own. They stare at you, and they are you, yet the reflections freeze like paintings, shifting in appearance to the dead you see in your nightmares, and once grinning, they open wide and speak to you! Scream at you. Until the images melt away, and all the glass breaks to rain down upon rotted wood planks.

"So the rumors ARE true," Edelstein marveled, and swallowed hard, placing his hand to the knob of the last shut door in the hall.

"The master bedroom," the agent called out, and he clung to himself, in such desperate need for a hug. For comfort. The company of only himself, as he stood trembling on the narrow landing.

Edelstein turned to face the agent, and then shot his gaze back to the task at hand. His own gloved hand, left steady at the icy knob. White gloves, and thick leather. Hence Edelstein couldn't feel the cool metal, but he could have sworn his breath was appearing in front of his face, as if he were smoking a cigarette. Blowing smoke in the dark, and there was a single mirror in the whole of the house which wasn't draped with a white bed sheet. All the clocks were stopped. Not a ticking to be heard, and not a sound, except perhaps for a mouse in the bare kitchen; of creatures lurking in holes in the home coming in from the cold, and out again, they only left disappointed. Not a drop of food. Not a crumb. Only dust, and sheets, and stopped clocks. Only a single bedroom where footsteps were often heard, but were more audible after dark.

Yet no matter the time, the presence of the captain was always allowed to emerge in fuller-force when new life breathed into his home. When someone stepped foot in it, and warmed its halls with their laughter and speech. With their energy. When someone came to tour his house, Captain Beilschmidt could materialize like a fog growing vivid in the dawning of a light. When you're traveling down a highway late at night, and your high-beams hit a flat stretch of land, and out in the field, you see a white cloud descended unto the earth, and you think to yourself, ‘Is Heaven falling, or am I flying?’ A white thick embodiment, created only of too much water in the air. Of changing temperatures. Nothing at all akin -- except in appearance -- to the unresting spirit of a captain who wanted to see his home loved, lived in, and well-lit again.

***

But if Captain Beilschmidt had died on a battlefield before the war ended, then...who covered the mirrors, and who stopped the clocks?

"I knew your brother," Edelstein whispered, as he turned the knob, and pushed open the door. His free hand to his heart, and he tried his best not to let his teeth chatter.

The master bedroom felt more like a walk-in deep freezer. A dark cave of a room, with wooden floors -- the same throughout the home -- and a slim window blocked by wood shutters. To the left of the doorway loomed a large bed, and straight ahead stood a bureau of drawers with a mirror atop it. Upon the dresser, Edelstein spotted a collection of small bric-a-brac: yellow ceramic birds -- at least ten of them -- amid old newspaper clippings; headlines strewn at their orange-painted feet.

Sure enough, a white drab bed sheet hung over the mirror. Hiding Edelstein's reflection from his sight, as he took another step towards the center of the room.

"A long time ago," Edelstein added in the same hushed tone. Peering into every dark corner, half-hoping the ghost would appear to him, and half-hoping this was a dream from which he'd soon awake.

"Is that so?" came the voice, and the sheet atop the mirror came flying down like a white dove shot from the sky. Plummeting with such force, the little yellow knickknacks tumbled about, and it's a good thing the dresser-top wasn't made of glass. Think of all the shattered birds! Their tiny heads would roll, and scatter to the floor like rocks used as confetti, or stones disguised as candy then thrown haphazard from a holiday parade float. From the hands of beauty queens waving with smirks on their faces. Throwing stones at children, when all they wanted was a treat. Armed with guns, the drivers of the floats could ease past the parents, emitting a sound all too familiar to the ghost, for it was a bullet to the brain which had killed Captain Beilschmidt. And now, lingering beneath the mattress of his king-sized bed seemed a most undignified way to start an evening. Dreaming of beautiful girls smirking at children they hope to harm. And of men driving cars, and shooting guns at mothers and fathers; aiming without a care, and firing at crowds.

It’s strange the way the mind of a ghost can wander. Of reliving a life they never lived; of living in an alternate reality. Half of him was here -- here being his bedroom; the only room he could stomach to haunt in ‘full force’ -- and half of him was still marching on a battlefield somewhere; tied to the makeshift cross. And that half of him lingered there most of the year. And in his head, he created odd daydreams to amuse himself. Yet there was always a breaking point. Some moment in the dream where everything corrodes, and the dream melts away into something more akin to a horror film. Thus the fantasies reverted to a form of self-torture; the visions became polluted, poisoned. A signal of menacing outside forces, as if someone out there were warning him, 'You can't stay on earth forever. Better come and join us.'

Hell hath no fury like a vacant seat awaiting a war captain who apparently deserved to be amongst the damned. Not amongst the living. Not beneath a mattress in a bedroom, peering out at the impeccable shoes of a man who at least had the courage to enter and speak to him. -- Shoes of a man dressed in a white suit, which lent emphasis to his dark waves of hair, and pleasant, although somewhat sad, violet eyes. -- Shoes of a man who had nearly leapt from his skin, when Captain Beilschmidt felt the need to test him, by ripping the sheet from the mirror, before skidding his way beneath the safety of the bed.

Squirming on his stomach like a soldier emerging from a trench, to crawl across a field, only to be greeted by an enemy. But ah, perhaps in his presence was an old friend who once belonged to his brother.

"West," came a whisper, and the sound of the name brought a sense of calm over Edelstein.

He smiled, and, "That's right," Edelstein said, just in time for the agent to finally steal onto the threshold of the bedroom.

Looming in the doorway like an officer on your porch, ready to report, 'I regret to inform you'...relaying a message no one wants to hear. And your heart aches inside your chest at the words you know will herald a lonely existence.

"I'm afraid I can't sell you this house," the agent said, and he toyed with the cuffs of his late father's best suit. "It wouldn't be fair."

Edelstein asked, "And why not? Surely a few creaking floorboards, and a falling bed sheet aren't reason enough to refuse selling a house to me."

"But it wouldn't be fair!" the agent blurted, repeating the vague excuse, and his eyes widened as if pained. "You shouldn't live in this place...you heard the voice. You know it's him!" The agent pleaded, "Please don't buy it, Mr. Edelstein. I love your music, and I'd hate for something bad to happen to you here," and he scrounged up the guts to step closer to the famous man. "With all your money, surely you can find something much better. Something much bigger!"

Edelstein laughed, but it was slight. A tone of curbed amusement, perhaps due to his noble upbringing -- trying to be polite -- while suffering second-hand embarrassment for the agent's sudden display of admiration and worry; a fan meeting an idol...

And no wonder the tour of the home could be arranged on such short notice, and on the eve of a holiday. _The_ Roderich Edelstein wanted an appointment to tour the old Beilschmidt house on Lakeside and Vine. Of course the agent could arrange it! And surely he hadn't gasped, and bragged about the appointment, and gushed to his mother about meeting the man whose records often played on the portable turntable downstairs near his mother's kitchen. Where the two of them sat at the dinner table, listening to the music the Vienna-born artist recorded while 'living abroad'. Living in secret. Living, which was more than any of Edelstein's old friends were doing.

A word no longer apt to describe them; his ‘friends’.

What few he had.

“But my brother is dead,” came the voice from beneath the bed, and the agent screamed and ran into the hall again.

Edelstein stood stiff. Adding another name to the long list of the deceased.


	2. Chapter 2

From the dark center of the master bedroom, "About the house," Edelstein called, "I'll take it. How much?"

The ghost of Captain Beilschmidt -- and Edelstein, too, perhaps -- fought back a laugh.

The captain peering up from beneath the bed, to spy more than just shoes.

"You'd think that guy had never stepped foot in here before,"  Beilschmidt said, and although Edelstein couldn't see it, the captain smiled at him. A clever smirk on the face of a discarnate soldier. Dressed in full uniform, but currently without shape or proper definition. A void where a life should be. A still-translucent apparition, yet he toyed with the thought of floating from beneath the bed. To show himself to the one man who remained in his room.

"Maybe YOU could sell this house to me, instead," Edelstein quipped.

"If it was up to me, you'd have it for free," Beilschmidt replied, and he sighed in relief at the sound of the real estate agent jangling a set of keys.

"I don't agree with it, I don't agree with it," the agent seemed to chant, as he returned to the bedroom in jaunty motions, like a child on the verge of throwing a tantrum. Forced to return a toy to the shelf after his mother told him 'No, you can't have that.' The long and lonely defeated march from the checkout counter, back to the toy section. To leave the item you wanted so dearly, just so some other kid could happen upon it, at a later time, and buy it, perhaps with money they earned themselves, so their mothers had no right to say no. And likewise, if Edelstein wanted to spend a tiny percent of his small fortune on an old drab house in a near-empty town, with a lake a half-mile away, and live out his remaining days in the company of a ghost, then who was the agent to say no?

Edelstein had indeed earned his money himself. He could buy any thing he truly wanted, and the agent shouldn't refuse him. Think of how heartbroken the child is, setting the toy back upon the shelf, only to go home empty-handed. Dreaming of the play-pretty, and lamenting over what could have been a fun afternoon.

"But if you insist, Mr. Edelstein," the agent huffed. "I'll let you have it for a certain price. After all," he said, as he passed the set of keys to the gloved hands of the musician, "I need to eat, too."

"Of course you do!" Captain Beilschmidt beamed, and it's a shame neither man in his bedroom could see it.

The agent shuddered at the sound of the ghost, and again felt the desperate need to bolt into the hall. But this time, he grabbed a hold of Edelstein's arm, and with a shrill pitch to his voice, he cried, "I just don't want you to complain to me, or change your mind, when this...this _person_ ends up keeping you awake every night!" And he shut his eyes, listening to Edelstein give a shake to the keys. Jingling, as if a bell was ringing, and surely somewhere, an angel now had wings. -- If holiday movies hold any truth, that is. -- A week since Christmas Eve, yet a feeling more akin to Halloween loomed heavy in the house, thanks to the ghost of a war casualty lingering beneath a bed. His head in his hands, palms beneath chin, and his arms bent; elbows on the floor: Captain Beilschmidt looking up and grinning like a schoolboy at his house's soon-to-be occupant.

"Tell him the price and leave," Beilschmidt teased, and slid one hand out from the shadows to tug at the pants of the man who held the keys.

Edelstein smiled, but _'ahem'_ -ed at the captain's suggestion. "It isn't very dignified to discuss money and business matters in the presence of others," Edelstein said with his nose upturned, though it was feigned for once, and he winked at the darkness, just hoping ghosts can see, despite not having eyes. Ghosts can feel, despite not having beating hearts. And ghosts can remember a man he once played alongside. When they were kids, and it was only once, but the brother of Beilschmidt had introduced the two: the captain and the man who felt a slight tug at his pants. Thinking it nothing more than a catch in the fabric, perhaps caused by his clothes being damp.

The rain falling, and the sun had set. Now street-lamps glowed in long orange rows along the curbside. Gunmetal-gray poles topped with glass globes emitting hazy orbs of light which bled out into halos of yellowish-white before trailing down to the blue-black pavement below. Maybe the lamps were gaslights, or maybe they were modern -- electric -- but either way, they radiated a mood akin to a vintage postcard crossed with a Van Gogh painting, like the one depicting a couple standing at a water's edge beneath a dark blanket of stars.

"I'll be paying in cash," Edelstein whispered, and with the agent's hand on his arm, he turned to the door, and felt he was escorting a kid from a crime scene, lest he grow further disturbed. "Tonight, if that's all right," Edelstein added, and he tucked the set of house keys in the pocket of his white suit jacket. "We can at least draw up the papers," he clarified before offering a motive: "I'd hate to know you couldn't afford to eat."

As if Edelstein was doing the young man a favor. -- As if there was nothing in it for him!

"Yes, sir...whatever you want," the agent stammered, and as they entered the hallway, he let go the musician's arm. "I didn't mean to imply..." he began, but a scraping-sound followed by a heavy thud within the master bedroom caused the agent to whimper and run towards the narrow landing. "I'll meet you at the front door!" he called, and grabbed tight to the banister, damn near tripping as he lunged down the stairs.

"What a coward," Captain Beilschmidt said, and this time, the voice caused the hair on the back of Edelstein's neck to stand on end.

A warm breath, or so it felt, tickled at the nape of his neck, and Edelstein's eyes grew wide for the first time that night. His heart beating fast, at the intensified feeling of being watched; at the feeling of a tall lean body standing only an inch or two behind him.

Turning to stare; turning on one heel -- on a dime -- and his mouth shot agape as his skin turned to ice.

"If you're there," Edelstein said, and for once, his voice shook, and a slight tinge of fear soon permeated his tone, "I'm not sure I want to know."

In the hallway, casting a shadow on the threshold; a shadow thanks to the soft orange light now lavishing the lone window, Edelstein faced the doorway of the bedroom, and there in that spot, with the uncovered mirror serving as a backdrop -- an overgrown picture frame, waiting for an image to be placed in its center -- appeared a blurred outline the shape and height of a man. A six-foot-tall burst of fog floating four inches from the ground.  Levitating above the wood floor, and a face with features such as a strong jawline and sharp cheekbones, and the long angular bridge of a rather cute nose, began to form at the top of the fog. Not much of a mouth was visible. Ah, but the eyes...there was still no color: none which Edelstein could decipher. Only the hint of blinking, and small bright circles, almost like the eyes of a cat in the dead of night, if someone who were colorblind shined a flashlight onto a nocturnal creature so used to hiding.

"You asked me how to jump rope," Captain Beilschmidt said. "Ha! Yeah, I remember you now..."

And as Beilschmidt spoke, Edelstein forced himself to take a single step towards the vision, but stopped as the chill in the air worsened, and he felt short of breath. Grabbing at his chest, as if the world was spinning too fast; as if someone was sucking all the oxygen from the room, and all the energy from the house.

Sure enough, the light downstairs in the foyer -- the room underfoot, for the floor of the bedroom served as the ceiling of the front entrance, where the agent sat in a corner, curled up in a ball -- the only fixture in the house fitted with a bulb, and it was flickering; the surge of electricity causing an eerie hum to creep up through the floorboards.

"You asked me how to jump rope," Beilschmidt repeated. "You wanted me to teach you, and when you fell down and cried, I threatened to make a noose of the rope, and tie it around your neck, if you didn't stop crying like a little baby girl man child." The captain's mouth finally visible, and he smirked at Edelstein, right as the bulb beneath them hollered out a shrill and piercing good-bye, then blew to pieces. The sound of glass shattering in the foyer failed to stop the ghost from recollecting; "You ran away, still crying!" Beilschmidt laughed. "My brother told me you hated me." And in an instant, as if a switch had been thrown, the fog began to dissipate. "That's the only time I ever saw you...I figured you still did."

A broken sentence, or a derailed train of thought, and the vision disappeared.

The doorway of the bedroom clear again, and the bedroom mirror reflected nothing but Edelstein's sheet-white face.

"Eighteen years," he said, in a sort of breathless gasp. "Eighteen years ago, and you remembered."

The captain's voice didn't greet his ears, yet Edelstein stood waiting for some form of response.

Waiting, and too afraid to reenter the bedroom. Too afraid, however, to return downstairs.

Edelstein slid to the floor, and wrapped his arms about his legs. Staring down at the wood planks; at the knots in the pine, and running a gloved finger in swirling lines, tracing the sawn-through remnants of the annual rings which denote the age a tree reached before it was chopped down. The same growth rings visible in the stump, as the roots - rendered useless -- remain. And it's strange to think how the tree is dead, yet the wood floors can still speak. Still complain. When just the right amount of weight is placed upon them. When just the right man sets foot into a dark house at just the right time. Just the right date. New Year's Eve. The anniversary. The night a ghost is apt to appear full-body and haunt his own house, well-lit, if only one room, but now the foyer was dim, and all which remained was the orange glow from the streetlamp, permeating the lone window in the upstairs hallway.

Edelstein wiped his cheek with his sleeve. "I'll stay with you...not tonight, but here in this house," he sniffled, "until the day you ask me to leave."

***

'And we can play games together again,' Captain Beilschmidt thought, 'like a couple of kids,' as he drifted off to sleep, or at least to dream. Wherever a ghost's mind goes, when he isn't amongst the living, and his spirit is tired from showing itself. When all the energy is wasted from the sources surrounding him, and he fizzles into a shapeless entity, like smoke once it rises too high to be fueled by a fire's heat.

And into the night sky, somewhere past the ceiling of his bedroom, and through the attic space, and the shingles of his roof, the ghost rose through the bleak clouds, up and over, until stars could be seen.

Though you'd never know it by looking, should you be flying in a plane, and peering out a window at that exact moment, while leaning over in your seat, nose pressed against a small circle of glass, to spy the ghost -- a war casualty -- floating over a rain-soaked town and a lake soon to flood its edges, Captain Beilschmidt was smiling with shut eyes, and a most serene sense of calm fell upon his unseen features. As he drifted on the wind, and awoke again, on the carpet of grass which grows on his grave. Tied to the cross, and he slept in its shadow. Re-forming again, and gaining energy, in hopes of returning home, as soon as he could manage the strength.

***

Edelstein climbed to his feet, and walked the length of the hall. His cheeks red, and his soul stricken with guilt; mumbling rather sheepish to the agent once he rejoined him in the foyer.

"I'm ready when you are," Edelstein said.


	3. Chapter 3

A new year dawned.

And out onto the streets, a few hours past sunrise, walked a man with a briefcase in hand. A brown hard-sided case, equipped with a lock and key. And in the pocket of his indigo coat was stashed an old set of keys. New to him, however, and he took comfort in the sound of jingling whenever he slid his fingers into his pocket, and removed the set of keys, just to peer down at them. Just to know, 'I'm going home.'

To a new home, and out into the open, on near-empty streets, Edelstein walked four blocks from the real estate office, to his yellow car parked alongside a tree. The backseat filled with boxes and papers; sheet music, and a violin case, housing a violin in need of new strings. And a vase once loved by his mother. One of the only heirlooms Edelstein still owned, post-war. And he used it to hold candy. Filled to the brim with sweets, and wouldn't Captain Beilschmidt enjoy it?

No, wait, maybe he wouldn't, thought Edelstein. Having to remind himself, his soon-to-be housemate was incapable of eating. Was incapable of breathing. Ah, but at least he could speak...

And listen. To any thing Edelstein wanted to say. To confess. At least Captain Beilschmidt could hear beyond the grave. And see. For at least he recognized Edelstein. From their childhood; their one prior meeting. And maybe a brother had introduced them, those eighteen years ago, and maybe a game was played, and harsh words said; idle threats, and name-calling, but surely games nowadays would be more civil. After all, how much fury could a ghost carry with him? For a man he had only met one time before. For a man who would soon be living in his rooms, and passing through his halls. Climbing his stairs, and cooking meals in his kitchen. Filling the house with warmth, and pleasant smells, and light.

Edelstein opened the passenger side door to his small yellow car, and tossed the paperwork from the real estate office into the seat.

Setting the briefcase against the hood of the car, he clicked open the lock with a tiny gold key, and riffled through the remaining stack of bills. "Paid cash for an old house, and even gave a bit extra, under the table..." Edelstein mumbled to himself. But despite his annoyed tone, he smiled, and a sense of pride filled his cheeks with color, and his eyes watered. "The least I could do."

Thinking of the night prior. How the agent had walked arm in arm with him, sharing Edelstein's umbrella. Through the rain, and back to their vehicles and back to the real estate office, once leaving Captain Beilschmidt's house on New Year's Eve. And at the agent's desk, they had discussed the deal, with Edelstein promising to return in the morning, to sign papers, and pay in full. -- Promise kept.

But on top of that, once locking the office, Edelstein had followed the agent to his house, to meet his widowed mother. A woman sitting alone at a dinner table, along with an emptied glass of wine. -- And whose record do you think was playing on the turntable? Whose violin was singing out in the background like a lullaby?? None other than...

'Mom, this is the famous Mr. Edelstein,' the agent had said, while gesturing towards the handsome brunette on their doorstep.

The mother had rose from her chair, hesitant, due to a fear of being awkward, but managed to sort of bow, and laugh, not too shrill. 'I'm pleased to meet you,' she had said.

And after exchanging niceties, and having a drink, Edelstein had driven home to his makeshift home; a family-owned property he didn't wish to repair; highly-damaged, and in need of upkeep. Too large. Too lonely. Too many memories. He had long ago decided to sell or abandon the place, as soon as he had purchased another, and now...the Beilschmidt house was his. It was all in writing. Paid for. Done.

But as Edelstein had returned 'home' last night, and crawled into bed -- in his old bed, for the last time -- he shut his eyes, and thought of the captain. Longing to recall his face and his voice.

Suffering from nightmares, he had awoke around Four AM, sitting up straight in bed, cringing over the image of a man lying in a yard, in mud; blood red slugs on his eyelids.

And Edelstein had rubbed his hand across his face, trying to erase the image. Trying to imagine something more pleasant.

'I'll have better dreams once I'm out of this place,' he had remarked, before drifting back to sleep. Only to awake a few hours later, to bathe, and dress, and take to the streets.

Briefcase in hand, and baggage loaded into the backseat and trunk. The long morning drive to the real estate office, located only a few miles from Lakeside and Vine, and only four blocks from the tree, where Edelstein had parked. Thinking it might be nice to get a better look at his new town; to get a feel for the neighborhood. Parking on the outskirts of what few businesses boasted an 'open' sign. Having walked to the office with a briefcase filled with a fraction of his fortune. And back to the car again, to linger outside a storefront.

"I'll buy some light bulbs and some groceries," Edelstein decided, and it felt nice, really, to live like a regular domestic nobody.

'Like a little housewife,' he thought to himself, and slammed the car door shut. Trekking from the passenger side to the entrance of the store. A bell above jingled, and it made him long for the sound on a daily basis. 'I wonder if I can get a bell for Beilschmidt's door,' he pondered, and waved to the lady sitting behind the counter.

"Nice day," he said, deeming his tone polite, but the lady seemed to recoil; narrowing her eyes as Edelstein approached.

"It's 'Happy New Year'," she said, correcting his greeting.

"Ah," Edelstein said, and his smile faded, "a Happy New Year to you, too, then."

Huffing a bit, thinking the lady presumptuous. 'Just who do she think she is? Of course I know it's New Year's Day! What world does she think I'm living in?! Doesn't she know who I am?? I don't need to be told...I didn't even have to say Nice Day, but I did!!'

He went on and on, scolding the lady, only in his mind, as he ventured down an aisle, searching for light bulbs and bread.

"You wouldn't happen to know if you have any bells in stock, would you?" Edelstein grinned as he spoke to the air; shouting out the question through the store shelves, while hidden from the lady's view, in the depths of aisle five. Finding the wooden shelves were poorly stocked. Items scattered out, as if a crowd had looted the store in a mad rush the night prior. As if most the items were damn near sold out. As if an ice storm had been looming, and people had flocked to the store, to buy every necessity in sight.

"Bells?" the lady called out from behind the counter. "Why on earth..." she trailed off. "You'll be lucky to find canned soup here!" she said. "Maybe try a hardware store next time."

"Hmm," said Edelstein, and grabbed a sack of flour from a shelf. A sack of sugar, too. And ah, the aforementioned soup. 'I wonder if Captain Beilschmidt likes fish chowder...'

Odd thoughts, as if shopping for a husband.

Edelstein scolded himself for a change, and tugged at his overcoat. "How about you tell me where I might find this hardware store you speak of," he prattled, as he re-approached the counter. "And do you have any milk or eggs?"

The lady shook her head 'no', but pointed to a back-room door. "I might have a few _special_ items I'm hiding to take home later," she whispered. "For the right price..." she gestured, sticking out her hand, "I could let you have some, perhaps?"

"Bootleg groceries," Edelstein said, and wasn't sure if he felt offended, or if the chance to behave like a rich man 'slumming it' was somewhat appealing. An adventure, of sorts.

"Sure," he said. And once setting the two sacks and the can of soup onto the counter, he dug through his pocket for the wad of cash he had retrieved from his briefcase. "I'll take a bottle of milk, and a dozen eggs if you have that many. Ah, and a pack of cigarettes, please."

"Cigarettes," the lady scoffed. "Such luxuries...you must be made of money!"

The lady turned her back to Edelstein, and dug through a carton. "My last pack," she sighed. "I can't seem to keep the men around here happy."

'Don't women smoke too?' Edelstein wanted to ask, but the lady seemed to grow ever-agitated and he thought it best to pay for his items, and go about his merry way. Back to the car. Back to his belongings. Back to Captain Beilschmidt's house, with at least enough items to bake something simple, and have a smoke once the kitchen was clean.

Ah, and that was another thing. The new house was in desperate need of cleaning. A good dusting, and sweeping. Floors mopped, and light bulbs fitted into every fixture. Mice caught, and bugs killed, and all the rooms needed their windows lifted, so the house could air out, and the ghost could breathe.

"What an odd thing to think," Edelstein said aloud, although he didn't mean to. And so he laughed, and, "Not you," he stammered, as the lady turned back to stare at him; studying him with wide eyes. Gazing at his hand, as if awaiting her payment, so yes, this strange man could be on his merry way.

"It's just..." Edelstein began, "I've bought this old house, a few miles from here, and...I'm a bit nervous this morning, you see."

"Well," she said, "as long as it's not Captain Beilschmidt's old house," she winked, "you should be fine."

Edelstein's face went pale, and he tallied up his money, hoping to appear unfazed by her comment. Counting out bills in slow motion. One Two Three...and he didn't feel anything. Money was a grand distraction. Even if spending it sent his stomach uneasy. At least it could fix problems, and make other people happy. At least it could ensure a young real estate agent and his widowed mother could afford to eat. And at least it could buy a few items for a musician to carry with him, to make an old house seem a little less abandoned; more homey. More welcoming.

"Well, what if I did," Edelstein finally said, and tossed the money onto the counter. "That should be enough for all this," he spat. "Now you go and fetch my milk and eggs!"

The lady nodded, and slid her last pack of cigarettes towards the scattered pile of cash. "Yes, sir," she said, and peered ahead at Edelstein as if he were both the bravest and the rudest man on earth.

***

Once the lady returned, Edelstein gathered his things, and exited the store. Ignoring the bell above him as it jingled, only reminding him of the one item he wanted most but had failed to purchase. "A hardware store," he repeated the suggestion, looking up and down the otherwise empty street, hoping to spot such an establishment.

He returned to his yellow car parked alongside a tree, and struggled to find the right set of keys to unlock the driver's side door. Cursing beneath his breath, and shifting the brown paper sack in his arms, Edelstein noticed a couple of men wandering somewhat aimless in the distance. Returning from the lake, he thought, since both men carried fishing poles. Perched on their shoulders, like soldiers armed with rifles.

“Excuse me,” Edelstein shouted to them, “can you tell me where I might find a hardware store?”

The two men passed by without so much as a glance. Not a word was uttered by them, despite Edelstein calling out again, “Excuse me??”

The fishermen continued down the street like two travelers lost in a dream. A long walk from a lake, a few miles away. A trip they’d repeat every morning, only known, perhaps, to those awake early enough to see it.

“Well then,” Edelstein huffed. “How very rude!” And he stopped himself from adding, ‘It’s improper not to speak when spoken to,’ and ‘I only needed help! How dare you ignore me...’ merely upturning his nose, and fumbling for the car keys. Returning his hand to each pocket of his coat and pants to dig for the right set. Finally in his grasp were the vehicle’s keys, and the not the one to his briefcase, nor the set for the Beilschmidt house.

The 'Edelstein' house, he corrected himself, and unlocked the door.

Climbing into the car, he set the bag of groceries beside the paperwork from the real estate office. ‘Paid in Full’ stamped red atop the heading. Edelstein leaned over, reading the fine print, or struggling to read it. Beneath the signatures, and 'On this date', and all the legal ramblings was an amendment written by hand. The agent had scrawled out in a near-illegible script: ' _Don't say I didn't warn you._ '

"How did I not see that this morning?!" Edelstein asked the thin air. "Huh..." he rambled on, reverting to keeping his thoughts inaudible for a while. Listening only to the engine hum as he drove from the parking space to the house on Lakeside and Vine; only a few miles away...

Only a few hours past sunrise. "And I'm already tired," he whined.


	4. Chapter 4

The yellow house looked smaller in the daylight.

Edelstein pulled up alongside the curb, and parked the car parallel to his new home. Yellow car, and yellow house, and he glanced to the residence with a worried tone, simply stating, “We match.”

He turned off the engine, and gathered a few of his things: the paperwork from the passenger seat, the brown paper sack of groceries, and the briefcase of money. Edelstein fished them into his arms, and somehow managed to open the driver’s side door.

Climbing from the vehicle, he stretched as if a long drive had just ended; as if he had driven five hours to arrive at the house, instead of five minutes.

“This old place,” he said, as he peered up towards the roof and the lone window which he knew looked into-and-out-of the upstairs hall, “needs so much work,” and his stomach turned knowing the day was young, and ‘miles and miles to go’ before he could rest, à la Robert Frost and his Stopping by Woods, lay ahead.

The early morning hours of a new year, and he had all the time in the world to clean the house, yet Edelstein felt a compulsive urge to complete all the cleaning and repairs in a single day; as soon as possible. Had to be done, and had to be perfect. But Edelstein was not a man with the greatest of strength. Prone to exhaustion; susceptible to fatigue. ‘I’ll just find a good starting point, and work 'til nightfall,’ he thought, and slammed the car door shut with his hip.

Failing to lock the vehicle, despite the priceless vase and expensive violin in the backseat, Edelstein trudged from the car, and his brown boots pattered akin to high heels on a tile floor as he stepped foot on the cobblestone walkway leading from the street to the front door and porch.

“I wish there was a swing,” he said aloud, and glanced to the perfect spot to hang one. Ah, a quaint little porch swing, like something from a magazine cover; Norman Rockwell Americana. A place to sit on quiet evenings. Lonely evenings, but what comfort it would bring...to sit on a front porch, and swing back and forth as slow as ghosts walking through a lakeside town at sunrise. But at sunset, Edelstein could sip tea or wine, or whatever struck his fancy at any given time, and peer out at the night, up to the overhang of the roof, while creaking back and forth in a wooden swing, painted yellow to match the house and car. And he could whisper to Beilschmidt about how clean the house is now, how every fixture is fitted with a bulb, how every crumb in the kitchen serves to feed the cute little mice, and no, he doesn’t know what his plans are for tomorrow, no he doesn’t know when he’s leaving again for a tour, nor when his next album is due to be recorded...discussing with the ghost of a war captain Edelstein’s floundering career as a reclusive musician. Living in secret for years, and once the press found out he had purchased a haunted house and spent his evenings rocking back and forth in a non-existent porch swing with a non-existent man, then...what a field day they would have! Thus Edelstein resigned himself, in that very moment, to spend the rest of his days indoors.

“Of all the silly things,” he scoffed at himself, dismissing the previous fantasy; having lost himself in a train of thought fueled by wanting to hang a swing on Beilschmidt’s front porch.

He studied the empty space a second longer, then set his in-arm belongings to the concrete. “A doormat,” he noted, as if creating a never-ending shopping list in his mind. “I’ll have to buy a doormat.”

Edelstein dug in his pocket for the house keys. Thinking of what the future welcome mat would read. Perhaps, ‘Wipe your feet! I just swept the damn floors...’

He smiled at the thought, and unlocked the door.

Stepping over the threshold, still imagining some bit of text scrawled onto a welcome mat. Just ‘Edelstein’ or ‘Beilschmidt’ written in bold thread would be more realistic. He narrowed his eyes at the floor as he rubbed his boots on nothing more than the dusty wood planks underfoot.

‘I’m home,’ he wanted to call out to the ghost, but he hushed away the temptation by humming his favorite piece by Beethoven. 'Ode to Joy'. Simple but sweet. He hummed, and shrugged, and turned back to pick up the array of items abandoned on the concrete of the front porch.

Upon reentering the home, he shut and locked the door behind him.

Searching for a place to unload again and to shed his indigo coat, Edelstein peered about, humming louder as his anxiety grew.

Opening a nearby door, Edelstein found a slim closet, most likely used for housing brooms or coats, or...whatever Beilschmidt once thought befitting of such a slender space.

‘Guns, maybe,’ Edelstein thought, and his humming ceased a moment, as he bent to the floor, setting the bag of groceries near his boots, and he stood straight again, stashing the briefcase and paperwork onto the top shelf of the closet. The humming resumed as he began unbuttoning his coat.

“Don’t you know any other songs?” Captain Beilschmidt whispered from beyond the back panel of the closet. As if he were hiding in the woodwork itself. “And don’t get completely naked!” the ghost laughed. “Not yet, anyway...I mean, after all, you only just got here.”

“I’m quite aware,” Edelstein said, but he swallowed hard. His face paled. The voice of the ghost had sent a chill down his spine. As if an unseen hand just dumped a glass of ice water over the head and down the back of an oblivious humming man. Too undisturbed by a hard day’s work ahead, to hum instead, oh, perhaps, Beethoven’s Fifth. -- _Da da da dum!_ \-- To signal the daunting tasks; to herald the endless list of ‘to do’ and ‘to buy’ and ‘to clean’ and ‘to bake’.

“But now that you’re here,” Edelstein began, only to be interrupted...

“I’m always here,” Beilschmidt lied.

Edelstein huffed. “Well...yes, I suppose you are,” he said, processing the idea.

“I think you meant,” Beilschmidt almost hissed from the confines of the dark closet, “now that YOU are here.”

Edelstein rolled his eyes at the correction, and unfastened the last button of his coat. Tugging the sleeves from his arms, he shed the coat, and paused a moment in fearful hesitation before reaching into the closet to search for a hanger.

“You getting friendly now?” Beilschmidt teased. “Want to shake hands?” Watching as Edelstein’s outstretched fingers felt about for a rod on which a hanger might be dangling; reaching into the darkness of the slender albeit oddly-deep closet. “You really can’t see me in here??” he asked.

“No,” said Edelstein, and he damn near yelled it. As if annoyed with himself for failing to spot the ghost with whom he spoke. “I can’t,” he added. “Should I be able to? It is daylight, you know.”

“You think I can only show myself at night?” Beilschmidt asked, and really, he didn’t know the answer either. More of a question for himself, or for God, or...for whoever was in charge of -- or at least keeping tabs on -- his soul nowadays.

Edelstein failed to find a coat hanger, so he sniffed at the air, offended. Turning on a dime, he cradled the coat in his arms, and tossed it across the nearest hard surface he spied. A plain chair in the far corner of the foyer.

“I made that myself,” Beilschmidt said, in reference to the chair, and his tone seemed defeated. Wishing Edelstein could see him. Wishing he knew all the answers, and didn’t have to ask. Wishing Edelstein would resume his humming, even if the song was simple. Even if it was 'Ode to Joy' on repeat.

Edelstein eyed the chair with his coat now draped across its backside. “Hmm,” he sounded, and glanced around, rubbing his wrist to his forehead. “It’s unusually hot in here,” he said. Surprised, because last night, when Beilschmidt was present, the room was icier than any place Edelstein had ever felt; colder than any place he had ever ventured, save for the Central Eastern Alps.

“Is it?” Beilschmidt asked, and the closet door slammed shut.

Edelstein gasped, and turned around to face it: the source of the sound; the shut door of the slender closet, and he could have sworn he heard footsteps approaching him.

“Are you...here now??” Edelstein asked, and stuck out his hand as if trying to stop an invisible flood. Moses raising an arm to command the parting of water. Lest he drown by the onslaught of a sea raging towards him.

“I told you, Fussy Pants, I’m always here.”

Unsure as to why he hoped to halt Beilschmidt’s actions, Edelstein held his breath, with one arm lingering, hand shaking, thinking any moment he’d feel more than just thin air. “I’m waiting,” he said, and he cringed at his own tone, thinking it demanding; thinking it impatient. Ungrateful.

“I’m coming,” Beilschmidt laughed. “You know, in my old age, I can’t exactly run around this place like a kid in a toy store.”

Edelstein smiled, and half-laughed, half-sighed in relief. “You’re not so old,” he said. “I remember...” he began, but his mouth shut, lips stiffened, and his eyes shot wide at the sudden touch of what felt like skin-on-skin. His fingertips brushed by the unmistakable contact of another human being. -- A not-so living creature.

“This is what you wanted, right?” Beilschmidt asked.

He slid the idea of his hand into the grasp of Edelstein.

“Yes,” said Edelstein, but tears reached his eyes. “This is what I wanted.”

What he hoped for. Standing in the front entrance of a haunted home, holding hands with a ghost. Enveloping his fingers atop what felt like calloused knuckles. The strong tired hand of a man who no, wouldn’t be so old, had he lived to reach proper adulthood. His appearance -- when he managed to show himself -- bespeaking a man forever twenty-one, but by now, Beilschmidt would have been a man in his early-thirties or so, and maybe early-thirties wasn’t so old, in the grand scheme of things.

Edelstein in his mid-twenties, however, looked almost like a teenager in Beilschmidt’s eyes. “You’re too pretty to be a man,” Beilschmidt remarked, and it felt to Edelstein like a warm hushed whisper in his ear.

Wanting to ask if the comment was a compliment or an insult -- maybe both -- but Edelstein shook his head, and fell silent. A slight smile soon re-enlivened his lips.

“The kitchen is that way, Mr. Smells Good,” Beilschmidt seemed to purr, and Edelstein felt a hand touch his chin. His face moved, turned to spy an open doorway; his head pointed without him doing it. Like a puppet operated by a spectral ventriloquist. “In case you want to put those groceries in the ice box,” Beilschmidt added, and the touch remained on Edelstein’s chin, yet soon it drifted along his jawline, and Beilschmidt rubbed his thumb across Edelstein’s cheek. “You gonna bake a cake for me?” Beilschmidt teased. “I like pancakes.”

“You’re so...” Edelstein said, though it was delivered near-inaudible; trying to say ‘silly’ or ‘impossible’ before finally stating, “forgetful. You can’t eat!”

“Who says I can’t?” Beilschmidt scoffed. “I can do anything! It’s still my house, isn’t it? Sort of my house...” he trailed off. A minute of silence before beaming, “It’s our house! Me and you, Fussy Pants. We’re a couple of homeowners now.”

“Funny how I didn’t see your name on the paperwork this morning,” joked Edelstein, and he stood toying with Beilschmidt’s hand. Like two young lovers swaying their arms back and forth while grinning over thoughts of a future they most likely wouldn’t share, but...wasn’t it fun to dream?


	5. Chapter 5

The man and the ghost stood holding hands a moment longer. A quiet moment, filled by the sound of something scurrying about at their feet. A soft brown mouse nibbling at dust bunnies near the baseboards. Soon he reverted to chewing on a wire attached to a lamp. Not plugged in, and the house had electricity, sure, but what use did a ghost alone have with illuminated lamps?

“I see we’ve got company,” Beilschmidt said, and his voice seemed to sound from behind a sheet of glass. As if Edelstein could hear him, but his speech now possessed a muted quality. Like a man talking to you from a far side of a room, or another room completely. A shy man too timid to face you, and so he hollers out his commentary through thick walls, and hopes his words reach you.

Edelstein glanced down to the mouse, and let go Beilschmidt’s hand.

“I’ve got something for him,” Edelstein sniffed, and it sounded like a threat, but the idea of the mouse as company seemed a most charming prospect. -- Perhaps the two could keep him as a pet!

“Well, you’re not gonna kill him are you??” Beilschmidt whimpered in a funny shrill tone. “I kinda like little mice...little bunny rabbits are cuter, though. Maybe you could bring home one of those! Next time you go out...” he prattled.

Edelstein felt something brush past his legs, and watched with an amused grin as the mouse levitated from the floor.

Squeaking, cupped in Beilschmidt’s unseen hands, the mouse rose right in front of Edelstein’s shocked gaze.

“Of all the strange things!” Edelstein remarked, and really, it was like watching a magic trick. Witnessing an act of miraculous proportions. Perhaps when Jesus walked across water, a ghost was aiding his steps.

Once the mouse was raised five feet from the floorboards, Edelstein stared into the little mouse’s face, and wiggled his nose at him, as if trying to communicate in 'mouse language'.

“His name is Herbert,” said Beilschmidt. “I’ve just decided.”

Edelstein tilted his head, and sort of cringed. “I think that’s a foolish name for a mouse,” he said, and stuck out a finger to rub the mouse between his perked-up ears.

“He might bite you for that,” smirked Beilschmidt, and watched as Edelstein bonded with their new pet. Or friend. Or...whatever relationship a ghost and a violinist can form with vermin.

“Unsanitary,” Edelstein deemed the mouse; struck by an afterthought. He withdrew his hand, and wiped his palm on his pants. “I...don’t want you to get the wrong idea,” he began, “I wasn’t going to kill him. I was going to feed him, but...then I think we should turn him loose outside.”

“Free him with a full tummy, huh?” Beilschmidt asked. “Yeah, I like that idea! Gotta feed the soldiers before they march off to battle...no need to face the enemy on an empty stomach.”

The little mouse continued to squeak, still appearing to float in mid-air while cradled in the grasp of Beilschmidt, who need not fear diseases carried by small creatures. No fear of germs; the word ‘unsanitary’ carried no meaning for a man buried in a grave miles away.

Edelstein fidgeted with the amethyst cuff-links of his white shirtsleeves. Ready to roll them up, in order to find a sink and wash his hands.

“The enemy?” he thought to ask. “I’m sure starvation in this house is his only threat.”

“Nope,” Beilschmidt said, now making the mouse swirl through the air like a tiny superhero in need of a miniature cape. Or maybe Herbert was a tiny fur-covered airplane, for the ghost made whooshing ‘ _nyoom!_ ’ sounds as the mouse flew about. “The cat next door, Genius,” Beilschmidt clarified. “I’ve got this neighbor who loves cats...you’ll meet him, I’m sure,” and his tone fell dejected. “He’s very friendly.”

The mouse ceased his flight and Beilschmidt whined, “I’m not sure he remembers me anymore.” The facial features of the ghost still a void; a clear space in a dusty foyer, though Edelstein was sure he could sort of make out an outline where a man should be standing. A sort of haze as the sunlight shined in through the open doorway of what Beilschmidt mentioned was the kitchen. A lazy light crawling up the hall, and it slid down the walls, and in its midst arose an almost smoke cloud in the shape of a human being, like a body traced on a sidewalk at a crime scene. Two long legs and two arms bent at the elbows. A translucent whitish shape, growing more opaque; turning somewhat gray.

“I’m sure he does,” Edelstein said, marveling over the sight growing in front of his face. “Who could forget you??” he asked. The hypothetical question brought him a strange dose of comfort. “I know I never will...nor have I.”

“You’re kinda sweet for a smug-looking guy,” Beilschmidt said, and the line about ‘who could forget him’ brought him a greater dose of comfort than Edelstein had found. -- Yes, who could forget him?!

“I don’t think I want you to meet him, though,” Beilschmidt said, again reverting tones; from playful to self-pity to complimentary to insecure. “You might like him better than me,” he sulked.

“I can almost see you now, you know,” Edelstein chimed, and he smiled a soft smile. “Did you know that?” he asked. “Can you feel it??”

Beilschmidt went quiet. The little mouse lingered in the air, and shook in the smoke-like shape of hands. “I don’t feel anything but you,” the ghost said of Edelstein’s presence. The man whose body heat seemed like a furnace fueled by the dead. In that small space -- in the foyer which bled into a hallway -- the man approaching him with the slightest hint of sweat on his forehead. How rare for such a dignified gentleman: to break a sweat, and not even while sweeping the floors or baking a cake! To break a sweat over entering a haunted residence.

Or perhaps the daytime presence of a ghost used energy in a different way. Appearing thanks to the new life breathed into his home. Not having to wait until nightfall. Not having to wait more than one night to have this new occupant move into his house. “Have I told you I’m glad you’re here,” Beilschmidt said. “Because I am.” And the little mouse floated down to the floor. The grayish hands slid out from beneath the creature, who scurried in a mad beeline towards the nearest dark crevice he could find. Thus disappearing from sight; another magic trick, though this time no thanks to Beilschmidt, who stood almost shivering as Edelstein reached out his arms in the direction of the ghost.

“You’re taking all the air right out of me,” Beilschmidt said, and gasped before admitting, “I’m not sure how this works, but you asked how it feels, and to be honest with you,” he nearly choked, “it kinda hurts,” and he forced a laugh. “You think maybe I could rest a minute?”

Taken aback by the request, Edelstein stopped his approach; nodding 'yes' in swift motions, as if scared of causing further pain. “I’m so sorry,” he said, and raised his hands, “I didn’t know. I didn’t mean to!” He grew defensive; a certain amount of venom in his delivery. “If you had just told me, I wouldn’t have bothered!”

“Just ignored me, huh?” Beilschmidt shut his eyes and placed one hand to his chest, as if a heart was still beating there, and it stood the risk of malfunctioning...or breaking. “I don’t think you could ignore me,” he laughed again, but it grew slight. A sound growing less akin to a voice heard in a faraway room, for now it hit Edelstein’s ears more like a voice seeping through the floorboards from upstairs. The master bedroom. As if Beilschmidt had floated up to hide in his former spot beneath the bed.

But Edelstein could still see his shape. The mist-like mass before him. “You were white last night, and felt like ice to me...now I’m hot, and you’re freezing and gray,” he tried to make sense of the situation by articulating it. “I wish I was a scientist,” he said, “instead of a violinist.”

“I don’t know if science has anything to do with it,” Beilschmidt said, and he opened his eyes just in time to see Edelstein turning away. His back growing small in the distance, as brown boots tread softly across wood planks. Not much sound, and very little effort, as if traipsing through an art museum. Edelstein peering at blank walls, thinking of what pictures he could hang there. Glancing up to the ceiling, at bulb-less fixtures, dangling and covered with cobwebs. Stopping short of the open kitchen doorway to spy a window in need of curtains.

“But I don’t feel like cooking pancakes,” was all Edelstein could think of to say.

A parting wave; his right hand lifted, though he never once looked back in the direction of the front entrance nor in the direction of Beilschmidt. Which was good, because the gray mass had lifted and ascended into the master bedroom, and then the attic space. Breathing easy the frigid air in the dark confines where no man ever stepped foot. Overcrowded by boxes, and crates, and one large black-and-white train trunk -- a hope chest, a woman would call it -- along with a few heirlooms, and a couple of guns leaned against a wall.

Beilschmidt lied there, floating in mid-air, like a superhero himself, napping on a cloud after visiting the living for a moment too long. The apparition appearing in daylight proved a costly risk: one Beilschmidt had no idea even existed. “I’m never doing that again!” he assured himself, and listened with an ever-growing contented smile as Edelstein rattled about in the kitchen downstairs.


	6. Chapter 6

Edelstein rummaged through kitchen cabinets, opening each door, and peering in at dusty shelves. “This place...” he muttered, and slid one finger along the wood, as if wearing white gloves, and judging a contest on cleanliness. If so, Beilschmidt had failed. Though perhaps it was the real estate agent’s fault. After all, no man can expect a ghost to keep a house in proper order.

Dead eleven years, and it was strange to Edelstein now, as he threw open each door, and then eased them shut, one by one, to imagine his new friend making breakfast in this home, not so long ago. To picture Beilschmidt standing on the tile floor barefoot, cooking sausage in a pan. Or maybe his blessed pancakes. Pouring too much syrup on them, most likely, Edelstein scoffed to himself. A sweet tooth, he bet, which called to mind the vase of candy in the backseat of his car. “Ah yes,” he noted, “I suppose I should bring in my things...oh, and the stupid groceries!!”

He scolded himself for getting distracted by Beilschmidt’s antics. “What a nuisance,” he said of the captain. “I’ll never get anything done if he appears every day...” yet Edelstein felt his heart sink over the last spoken thought, and hoped to God Beilschmidt hadn’t heard him.

Out into the hall again, Edelstein scurried towards the slender closet. Scooping the groceries in his arms, he rushed them to the kitchen, and stashed them in the ice box. “Not plugged in,” he remarked, and bent down, fiddling with a wire behind the short white appliance.

Once the fridge was plugged in, he turned the latch again, to make sure the interior of the ice box was blowing cold, though the hum could be heard just by standing in front of it. Still, he stuck in his hand, and let it linger above the sack of food. Knowing damn well he should stash the flour and sugar and soup elsewhere, but despite that, he sighed, and felt apathetic towards the future condition of his purchases.

“They’ll be fine,” he dismissed the situation. “At least the eggs and milk will keep.”

Not wanting to sort and separate the array of items, he simply shut the fridge, and exited the kitchen. Back to the foyer, and to the front door. He slipped out onto the porch, leaving open the entrance of his home. Down the steps to the cobblestone walkway, Edelstein slogged along like a kid sent on an errand he was too tired or too bored to commit. ‘I should have asked Beilschmidt to bring in my things,’ he joked to himself, and stopped in his tracks, wondering if Beilschmidt could even leave the house. ‘He said he’s always here,’ Edelstein recalled, and had no idea if the sunlight could harm the spirit. “Surely at night,” Edelstein decided aloud of Beilschmidt's ability to go out, and he resumed his trek to the car.

As he gathered his things from the backseat -- a violin case beneath his arm, and the priceless candy-filled vase in hand -- Edelstein left the car door ajar, and glanced over to a nearby house. Convinced it must be the residence of the so-called ‘friendly’ neighbor. A small and cute property, topped with a green roof, the same hue as Beilschmidt’s roof, yet the exterior was white, and the front door was blood red. “Like an Italian flag,” Edelstein noted of the colors: the three combined to make a more lively looking home than the one in which Edelstein now resided. ‘I suppose I should go and introduce myself,’ he thought, as he headed back to Beilschmidt’s porch. 'Later, though,’ he added in his mind.

Reentering the home with his most valuable belongings, Edelstein set the violin case next to the chair Beilschmidt had built himself, and he set the vase on a small empty table. “There,” he said. “Good enough.”

But several more trips were made, back and forth to the vehicle. A couple of suitcases were brought indoors. A few boxes were dropped by the foot of the stairs. A stack of sheet music was tossed into the closet, to sit atop the paperwork and briefcase housing money. “I suppose I should find a bank, or buy a safe,” Edelstein recommenced adding to his never-ending to-do list.

Wondering if there was much crime in the neighborhood. Thinking, perhaps, a robber might break in, and steal his small fortune! The money he had on hand, however, was nothing compared to the amount he had stashed elsewhere.

A bit out of breath from numerous treks to the car, to the house, and back again, Edelstein slid his hands to his cheeks and then rubbed at his shut eyelids. “I need a nap,” he whined. And in that moment, he could almost see Beilschmidt doing that very thing; napping in the shadows somewhere, and Edelstein uncovered his eyes, glancing up to the ceiling, and he smiled. “You want me to join you?” he asked the thin air.

Edelstein -- due to the thought of robbers still plaguing the back of his mind -- returned to the car one last time, only to lock it. Most items had been carried inside the home; only the trunk contained a remaining box and a large framed painting. “They can wait,” he said, and scurried back to the porch with his hands stuck in his pockets. Breathing in the cool breeze of that January morning, he stepped from the walkway and instead traipsed about the yard, longing to hear the sound of leaves crunching beneath his boots, or that delightful sound of snow underfoot.

No such luck, for the yard was barren, save for patches of dull grass and dirt. “Pitiful,” Edelstein said of the neglected yard, and wished he had the energy to plant a garden full of roses and other colorful flora to line the cobblestone and adorn the outskirts of the porch.

Once inside the home, Edelstein locked the front door, and turned to face the foot of the stairs. A strange sound reached his ears, like the static you find on the other end of a phone line when the connection is bad. A crisp, raspy drone, lulling out from the cracks in the floorboards overhead. “Maybe he’s snoring!” Edelstein marveled at the thought of Beilschmidt napping, and making sounds like an electrical current when the wires have been spliced, perhaps chewed on too long and too often by a wayward mouse named Herbert.

‘Though if his speech sounds perfectly human, why would his snoring sound like telephone static?’ Edelstein wondered, and again envisioned Beilschmidt curled up and cozy, resting on his bed, or perhaps beneath it. ‘Will we share the bed??’ Edelstein pondered, and he couldn't help but grin. “Of all the silly things,” he said, and rushed to the banister, regaining his strength -- or at the very least, his enthusiasm -- thanks to the odd images in his head. Picturing a big strong man such as Beilschmidt spooning him, and yes...he rather liked that idea.

Grabbing tight to the stair-railing, Edelstein worked his way up to the second floor, and paused on the landing. The upstairs hallway looked longer than it had before. Like a maze an artist was too lazy to bless or curse with twists and turns, for the hall was as straight as ever; a long tunnel-esque line with doors on either side, just like last night, but somehow, it seemed to Edelstein, there was a trick to crossing it now. As if a trapdoor had been planted in the floorboards. As if a riddle would have to be solved to reach the hallway’s end.

“I’m up here, if that’s all right,” Edelstein called out, and remembered the pain Beilschmidt had complained of, an hour or so prior. “I can wait a while longer, though, if you like.” Playing Mister Nice Guy. As if the solution to the riddle lied in Beilschmidt giving him permission.

No answer came, however, so Edelstein pressed on. Tiptoeing, or a motion damn near it, as he ventured down the hall. “Captain Beilschmidt?” he finally thought to entreat the ghost by name. “May I rest a moment??”

Such formalities were now exhibited by Edelstein, for the guilt of hurting his new friend was finally sinking in. -- Here was a ghost who existed eleven years in loneliness. Longing for another human being or a whole family to move into his home, yet...every time the real estate agent actually allowed others to tour the house, Beilschmidt would frighten them away. ‘Did he do it on purpose?’ Edelstein wondered, and looked at every shut door, even letting his fingers hover above doorknobs in the hopes of sensing either an iciness or an emission of heat.

‘I miss you already,’ Edelstein longed to add, but the strange static-sound grew heavier, hushing out the temptation to confess.

“Are you all right??” he begged, and when he reached the last door in the hall -- the shut door of the master bedroom, although Edelstein failed to recall shutting it last night; in fact, he was quite sure the door had remained open when he and the agent left the house -- Edelstein grabbed the knob and attempted to turn it. “It’s locked!” he said.

Infuriated by the inability to enter what was essentially his own bedroom, “Hey!” Edelstein shouted, and clenched his hand against the door. Several fist-falls landed and echoed throughout the hall; knocking as hard as he could. “This is my room too, now, you know!!"

The static-sound died in an instant. "Don't get your panties in a twist," a sleepy voice drifted from the attic overhead. Beilschmidt yawned, and offered an explanation: "I always keep it locked when I'm not in there."

“I'd think you'd keep it locked when you ARE in there!” Edelstein said, baffled by Beilschmidt’s practice. “I mean really...why on earth would you lock something that’s empty??”

Edelstein heard the internal mechanism of the knob ‘click’, and he pushed open the door to find the room exactly the way he had left it: a white bed sheet slung to the floor, and the array of yellow knickknacks scattered about the dresser-top. “I see you haven’t cleaned in here,” he sniffed.

Glancing away from the evidence of Beilschmidt's 'trick' on New Year's Eve, Edelstein surveyed the room, expecting to spy the gray mist-like spirit he last spoke to downstairs. Thinking -- 'Any second now, surely!' -- Beilschmidt would appear as a full-blown apparition again. Instead, Edelstein's only proof of not being completely alone in that room was the voice of the captain, who indeed floated nearby.

“Yeah, well,” Beilschmidt replied, “what have you cleaned yet, Fussy Pants?? I bet you haven’t even cooked my pancakes!”

With a huff, Edelstein turned in time to see a long indentation form in the center of the mattress. As if a man was outstretched on the bed, and even one pillow sunk in, displaying a concave depression. “Comfortable?” Edelstein asked, sneering a bit.

“It’s not as cushy as the air in the attic, but you know...it’ll do,” Beilschmidt said, and punctuated the statement with the sound of his unseen hand patting against the mattress. “Why don’t you climb on board and feel for yourself?”


	7. Chapter 7

Edelstein lingered near the dresser, and noticed in the mirror’s reflection, the bed could not be seen, for the mirror faced the door. Checking the glass as if hoping maybe he could spot Beilschmidt lying on the bed -- spot him as an actual image of a man -- and not just a void whose weight caused a change in the mattress.

At least there was that, though, Edelstein figured, and thought it strange how Beilschmidt could make sound and speech and give off heat and chills, and make objects move, and his body itself could still affect surfaces beneath and around him, yet...”You said it hurt you earlier,” Edelstein began, “when I stood near you downstairs. And now you want me to lie down next to you??”

“You don’t have to,” Beilschmidt blurted. “It was just a thought.”

“Hmm,” said Edelstein, and he reached out, lifting one knickknack from the dresser-top. “So you like birds?” he asked. “You must,” he added, while counting the numerous figurines. All toppled like a menagerie of canaries with a drinking problem, having left a bar which forgoes the seed for the sake of tiny tequila shots.

“I guess,” said Beilschmidt, and although Edelstein could neither hear nor sense it, Beilschmidt fiddled his feet together as if trying to slip off a pair of too-tight shoes.

Lying flat on the bed, with one hand still resting on the mattress -- his other hand atop his stomach -- Beilschmidt studied the man who studied the birds. “Everyone’s gotta collect something, right?” the ghost assumed. “I’m sure you have some strange collection you can set up in here...once you move in everything.”

“Oh, but I’ve already moved in!” Edelstein boasted; proud of himself for having brought in almost all the boxes and suitcases from the car. “You should see the downstairs now,” he snickered. “It looks like an obstacle course.”

Thinking of the crowded foyer, and the first-story hall which led only to a kitchen, a dining room, and a parlor, Edelstein rubbed the ceramic bird’s smooth surface with slow strokes of his fingers, tilting the bird in his hand, and gazing at its small painted face. “Come to think of it,” he said, “I just now realized the shattered glass was gone,” and his eyes went wide as he glanced to the bed. “The fixture last night!” he recalled in a tone growing in shock, “The bulb blew!! And you...”

Beilschmidt laughed, “Yeah, I’m good for something, aren’t I?”

He shot an unseen wink at Edelstein, and rubbed at his stomach, wishing he could at least smell pancakes, if not eat them. “And you said I hadn’t cleaned anything yet...well, maybe not up here, Fussy Pants, but I did sweep up downstairs before you got here.”

“You can use a broom??” Edelstein marveled, and for whatever reason, he slid the ceramic bird into his shirt pocket. The coolness of the object felt two inches from his racing heart. “Why, that’s wonderful!” he said, as if a lifelong vacation from his most hated household chore had just been bestowed upon him. Now if only Beilschmidt could claim the ability to do yard work --  if yes, he CAN venture outside, in the daylight, safe in the sun -- then Edelstein would be all set!

“Broom, my ass,” scoffed Beilschmidt. “I swept it up with my bare hands! Picked up each little shard, and...”

“Let me guess,” Edelstein interrupted to mock, “you ate them for breakfast.”

Big manly man, sweeping with his hands; a broom too womanly a device, Edelstein presumed Beilschmidt would characterize it, due to his current attitude.

“No,” laughed Beilschmidt, but a sound akin to a cough followed it; clearing his throat, he continued in a weaker tone, “I didn’t eat the glass, and...” his voice fell a bit sheepish, “to be honest with you, I couldn’t find a broom.”

“Oh,” said Edelstein, and he approached the bed, staring at the closest corner of it before sitting down, and settling in, like a doctor engaged with a patient suffering from a mild bout of amnesia. “Is it possible you never owned one?” he asked. “If you had kept it in that slender closet, you’d know right where it is.”

“Or maybe that sneaky real estate agent stole my broom!” Beilschmidt seethed. “You know, I think he took a lot of things from my parlor. Ah! Like the cuckoo clock my brother made for me!!” he shouted. “I know that’s missing! I can’t hear it anymore,” he said, and again, his voice went weary. “It’s a good thing he never found the key to the attic...I’ll tell you that much, Fussy Pants.”

“Because that’s where you like to sleep?” Edelstein asked, yet his mind still troubled over the thought of the ghost forgetting where he stored items in his own home. “I’m sure the broom is around here somewhere...” he trailed off, scooting further onto the bed, so as to lean back on his hands, raising his legs and peering at his boots, like a little kid in a swing with no one to push him, for Edelstein touched his toes to the floor again, and lifted his legs again -- repeating the motion a few times -- before concluding, “and the clock, too.”

“But if the clock was still in the house, Smart Guy,” Beilschmidt argued, “I could hear the ticking and the tocking.” 

“Perhaps all the clocks in the house have been stopped,” Edelstein said. And sure enough, Captain Beilschmidt’s brother, West, had made sure of that, as soon as the war was over, and he was able to enter the inherited home. No ticking clocks, no uncovered mirrors to show reflections of the man now outstretched on the bed. And long after West had died, the friendly neighbor who loved him, snuck into the house, and 'borrowed' the broom. -- No wonder the home was so dusty!

The widowed mother of the real estate agent had often nagged her son to let her go and clean the house, in hopes of it selling, but...the agent had never wanted it to sell. Despite needing the money; needing the deal to be closed; the location -- or its upkeep, at least -- marked off his own never-ending list of things to do. For just as he tried -- but failed -- with Edelstein, ever since the young agent was first assigned the task of unloading the property, he had continued the tradition of dissuading those interested in touring the lakeside residence. Never wanting a person or whole family foolish enough to buy it, to later be harmed, and it ultimately be his fault.

“Did the real estate agent tell you that last night?” Beilschmidt asked of the clock. “'Cause I never thought of it before...”

“Yes, he might have,” Edelstein tried to recall, “or maybe I just noticed it myself. You know, that is the usual practice, after all,” and he ‘ _ahem_ ’-ed to fill in the blank left by omitting the final words: ' _when someone dies_ '.

A practice perhaps outdated, yet many still carried on with it, in order to honor the dead, though it was likely a practice built on superstition. The hour of death signified by ceasing the visible passage of time. The proof of life going on without their loved one; proof in every tick and every tock, yet by stopping the clocks, the dead could leave this world without the reminder of time. A more gentle, and silent good-bye. Let time stop for no living man, but only the dead, and the ghost could ascend unto Heaven without a barrage of ticking clocks! -- Ah, and God forbid the clock isn’t stopped during the hour of death. For if the ghost hears the ticking of a clock in his home, he’ll think himself still amongst the living; still a normal man, tied to this earth, carrying out his daily routine beneath the weight of the clock’s hands. ‘Time for bed,’ the ghost will think, when the clock strikes ten, and he’ll go upstairs to his bedroom, and stretch out on a mattress instead of lying in a makeshift grave somewhere. Miles away, and sure, Beilschmidt’s grave wasn’t empty. No clocks within earshot of the tied-together cross. Only birds sometimes perched on its arms, pecking at the wood and plucking at the strings. A reminder of how Beilschmidt’s final resting place was merely part of the scenery. They might as well have buried him beneath a telephone pole...all the birds on the wire could keep him company.

And so the clock in Beilschmidt’s parlor had not been stolen. It still hung on the wall near an oversized blue armchair. One Beilschmidt had not sat in for the past eleven years. A room Beilschmidt didn’t like to visit, for despite the presence of his beloved clock, there were also pictures on the walls. Pictures of he and his brother in childhood. Pictures of their parents; his other family members, and friends. All framed and gathering dust, staring out like fading postcards sent a dozen or so years ago, and no one would even recognize the people in those photos.

No one, save for Edelstein and the friendly neighbor, of course.

But if the clock had been stopped during the hour of death, instead of a year and some months later -- at the war’s end -- then maybe Beilschmidt wouldn’t have been able to haunt his own home. Maybe he wouldn’t have returned to it, once leaving the war, marching along in a bloodied yet colorless version of his Luftwaffe uniform. The wool cap blown from his head, thanks to a gun, and silver hair brushed from his eyes with the back of his wrist. The way he waved his hand, along with his fellow faceless men, as if to say ‘Good Game’ to an opposing team, like a kid exiting a ballpark unashamed by his defeat.


	8. Chapter 8

The room grew quiet as Edelstein toyed with the temptation of lying down upon the bed. The afternoon sun blocked by shutters, and Beilschmidt’s bedroom was just dark enough for a nap.

“I could restart the clocks, if you like,” Edelstein said, and he yawned despite trying to suppress it. Patting at his mouth, and half-mumbling, he added, “If you think it would help...”

Beilschmidt narrowed his eyes at Edelstein, and cocked his head while attempting to decipher the offer. “Why would that help?” he asked. “I mean, what on earth could it possibly do for me now?? You think starting all the clocks in the house back to their ticking and tocking would somehow cure me of something?!” he laughed, but it was harsh; his tone bitter and resentful. “I don’t know what it is you think I’m suffering from over here, Fussy Pants, but I can tell you right now, restarting the clocks ain’t gonna help.”

Beilschmidt sat up, and scooted his unseen form to lean against the headboard. Sort of sulking, and cross-armed, he nudged one boot-toe into Edelstein’s side. “You saw me pull that sheet down last night,” he said, “and nothing happened to me, right? No big deal,” he raised his hand, dismissing the previous situation, then retreated his foot from Edelstein’s waistline upon seeing the other man cringe at the forceful touch.

“That hurt!” scolded Edelstein, as he rubbed at his side. “I was only thinking out loud.”

“Well, maybe you should keep your thoughts to yourself,” said Beilschmidt.

“And maybe you should keep your feet to yourself!” shouted Edelstein.

Followed by a short burst of silence.

Beilschmidt drew his knees to his chest, sitting with his feet as far away from Edelstein as he could, lest he forget and nudge at him again.

“How did you even know it was my foot??” Beilschmidt finally asked. “It could have been my hand...or my nose,” he laughed. “How do you know what I’m doing, or where I’m at??” he continued to inquire, his tone growing shrill in a near-comical way. “I could be on the ceiling, poking at you with a fishing pole!”

Edelstein scoffed, “I know you’re still on the bed,” and he reached into his shirt pocket, “I can see the curve in the mattress. Besides, the pillows are all scrunched up behind you there." And once retrieving the ceramic bird from the confines of his pocket, he held it tight in his fist. “Plus, there’s a dark shadow on the headboard...unless it always looks like that,” and with a jerk of his arm, Edelstein flung the tiny knickknack towards the headboard.

“Ah!” shouted Beilschmidt, and sure enough, the bird’s flight to the head of the bed was stopped in mid-second. The bird halted in mid-air. Stuck there, hovering above the mattress.

“See?” said Edelstein. “I knew you wouldn’t let it break,” he reasoned. “I knew you were still here.”

“Uh-huh,” panted Beilschmidt, out of breath from the sudden motion of uncoiling his body and uncrossing his arms in order to catch the ceramic bird. “You could have killed him!” he whined. And the tiny bird was soon clutched to his chest. Edelstein watching with a wide yet humored gaze as the little bird descended and floated closer to the headboard.

“Surely there was an easier way to find out...” Beilschmidt trailed off. Muttering something about his favorite bird. “You don’t get it,” he said in a clearer tone. “This one’s got an inscription on his underside. Says here, he was made in Germany, in Nineteen Twenty-Two, and that’s my birth year. I got this one when I was born,” he added. “I bet you don’t have any thing from your birth year, now do you? Of course not, Mr. Sad Eyes. You probably left it all when you moved.”

“How do you know about that?!” Edelstein snapped, and his cheeks went red for whatever emotion boiled in his chest. Maybe pain, or shock, or...“Wait a second,” Edelstein shook his head, and glanced anywhere except at the headboard. “Did you mean my move here??" He took a deep breath. "Or the last time I moved.”

“You know what I meant,” Beilschmidt didn’t answer, because really, Edelstein hadn’t asked. -- Not a proper question, for Edelstein had took offense not at what Beilschmidt had said, but how he had said it. The way he seemed sickened by that final word: ‘move’. If it were written by Beilschmidt, instead of spoken, it would have been italicized. Implying the ‘move’ Edelstein should be ashamed of. Or so Edelstein felt Beilschmidt had implied. Assuming now Beilschmidt knew about his years in hiding. His forged papers; a fake name. But what did Beilschmidt expect of him?? To stay and face the fight? Board a train?! Rich kid lucky enough to get the hell out of Dodge prior to the proverbial shit hitting the fan; The Night of Broken Glass. Nine years old at the time, and yes, most of his belongings were abandoned: later destroyed or stolen.

Edelstein repressed; he simplified; asserting in an angered yet stoic rush, “I did what I had to do, and you did what you had to do, and...”

“Look where it got me,” Beilschmidt finished the line.

Edelstein sighed, unamused by the ounce of black humor which seemed to emanate from Beilschmidt’s conclusion. Unsure as how else to take it, “I don’t want to look,” he finally said, as if Beilschmidt meant the command literally instead of figuratively. “You were wrong, though,” Edelstein added, attempting to change the subject, “I DO have one item from my childhood,” and he took the softer-toned moment as an opportunity to move from the bottom corner of the mattress; easing his way towards the top of the bed. “I have a toy. A plush cat. Mohair, I believe,” he prattled, while crawling on his hands and knees in the direction of the headboard.

“Steiff?” Beilschmidt asked.

"Yes, maybe he was made by Steiff...a little fuzzy kitten with a bow tied around his neck, and a tiny jingle bell attached to it," Edelstein reminisced. "I used to have to tell him to be quiet, and he wouldn't listen, so I cut the ribbon and threw away the bell." Rambling on, trying to think if the kitty was safe inside the house or still packed away in the trunk of his car, Edelstein finally reached Beilschmidt, whom he still could not see. Taking a wild guess he had reached him...settling in next to the floating bird. Edelstein kept his eyes affixed to it, hoping he wasn’t settling in atop Beilschmidt’s lap! For the curve in the mattress was now harder to detect. As if Beilschmidt had climbed onto the headboard, perched there like a bird on the arm of a cross, or lingering with bent legs atop a wide telephone wire, merely dangling the ceramic knickknack as a carrot for a horse to follow, not to water, but to a blank space where a ghost sat indiscernible to Edelstein’s naked eye.

“You are still up here?” Edelstein asked, a certain amount of worry in his delivery. Yet he smiled, and added, “This was your idea, after all...”

“Yeah, a million years ago,” Beilschmidt teased, and it comforted Edelstein to take note of how close the voice came to his ear.

“You are right here,” he said, and forbid his smile from growing. “I figured as much.”

“You could have thrown another bird at me, just to be sure...”

“I’m out of birds,” Edelstein joked, tugging at his pocket. He stretched out his legs, longways and proper upon the mattress. Giving in to the temptation of lying flat atop the bed in order to take a nap, or at least to fulfill Beilschmidt’s suggestion of finding out for himself whether or not the bed was comfortable. To get a feel for himself, as Beilschmidt had said, in a moment which seemed not a million years ago, but indeed a long time beforehand. The day passing by in slow motion. Afternoon giving way to evening, and the sun growing dim, though thanks to the shutters, the man and the ghost had no idea it was yet another rainy night on its way, and therefore clouds were to thank for the dimming of the day. Bleak and dark, and slow and quiet, as the two new friends lied alongside one another, both with outstretched legs, and arms aligned.

“If we stay here like this,” Beilschmidt said, “and you fall asleep,” his voice weakening like a song once it reaches its ending; a recording of an orchestra as it runs out of steam, and the final notes grow slow and hazy, “don’t be surprised if I’m gone when you wake up.”

“You’ll come back though,” Edelstein breathed out deep, and shut his eyes. “Won’t you?” he asked. And as if speaking from a dream, he answered himself: “You’ll come back to me.”

No clock marked the minutes as they passed from the last line spoken to the time in which Edelstein fell asleep. Beilschmidt ascending from the bedroom to the attic space, in order to search for a key. Wanting to pass it on to another human being for the first time in his eleven years of this type of existence. Taking advantage of Edelstein’s nap in order to rummage about the locked attic. The key hid somewhere in its dusty confines. How can anyone enter a room when the key to the room is locked inside it? Beilschmidt was a clever man, but a forgetful ghost, and ‘Just where did I put that damn thing?’ he may have whispered before trailing up and out through a leak in the shingles like a rising wisp of smoke. Greeted by the first few drops of rain -- surely a bath for a ghost; too bad it wasn’t a baptismal; if only holy water rained down from the heavens -- and in that moment, Beilschmidt could not even remember his own first name, let alone the location of a single rusted key.


	9. Chapter 9

Edelstein lied sprawled out on the bed, one wrist perched light atop his forehead, as if checking his own temperature in his sleep. Detecting a fever? No, suffering from vivid dreams of a man tap dancing in the attic. Perhaps slinking from a boarded-up window out onto a ledge and onto the roof to sprinkle coins onto the shingles. Filling up the leaks with spare change. 'Pennies from Heaven' playing in the background, as a man dressed like Fred Astaire reached out to him, and Edelstein awoke emitting a strange sound of exasperation. 

“Ahck,” he shouted, then groaned, “would you stop that?!” 

Sitting up straight in bed, rubbing his eyes, he added, “I hate that damn song.”

Edelstein clutched the mattress with both hands, and leaned forward, blinking hard at the dark room and his strange surroundings. Not used to awaking in another man’s bedroom. He peered over to the dresser and its uncovered mirror, reflecting what little light could be seen from the hall. A soft flickering traipsed across the glass like oversized fireflies were sailing past it. Edelstein narrowed his eyes, and tried to make sense of the display. “Are you playing some sort of trick?” he asked the idea of Beilschmidt.

\-- The idea, for he sensed the ghost himself was not inside the room. 

Edelstein scurried from the bed, touching both feet to the floor; his ankles stiff from having slept in his boots. 

He smoothed at his shirt, and tugged at his cravat before sliding his fingers through his hair. “How are you doing that?” he asked.

Taking one last look at the mirror, Edelstein raced into the hall, and saw a long row of candles lit and burning in front of every shut door. One candle, however, sat directly across from the opened bedroom door, therefore casting the flickering light towards the mirror. “Nice trick,” Edelstein said, and he smiled as he studied the scene. Each wax candle placed upon a saucer atop the floor. Each candle emitting a high flame. They sort of danced as if a soft breeze -- unfelt to Edelstein -- was drifting through the corridor. “Did you do this for me?” he asked. Thinking the set-up looked akin to an airport runway. The candles serving as a guide for Edelstein to find his way back to the stairs. 

“Are you waiting for me somewhere?” he asked, and wondered if perhaps he should start exploring the other rooms connected to the hall. As he approached a shut door nearest to the master bedroom, “Are you in here??” he asked. Unsure as to what lied beyond the door, and hell, maybe it was locked, but Edelstein saw and heard not a hint of response from Beilschmidt, so he forwent turning the knob. ‘I suppose it can wait until daylight,’ he thought, yet his eyes stayed affixed to that particular door. A feeling of someone watching him soon flooded his heart with an ache akin to embarrassment. His cheeks went warm and red. “I know you’re here somewhere...” he managed to say, and he swallowed hard, thinking the hall took on a more eerie quality than earlier in the day. Nighttime now, for the past several hours had been napped away. 

“What a waste,” Edelstein mouthed, and he shivered, crossing his arms at his chest, and rubbing his elbows. Breath evident in front of him as if smoking an invisible cigarette. Teeth chattering as he spoke, “Now I know you’re here!” 

A laugh sounded from a room beside him; one door down, closer to the stairs. 

“Come in here,” Beilschmidt called. 

Edelstein huffed, and ventured to the right room. Two doors down from the master bedroom. Grabbing the knob, “You could have answered me the first time,” he said, and pushed open the door, and it creaked; hinges rusted, or perhaps the door just hadn’t been opened in years. Creaking worse than the floorboards of the upstairs hallway...

“Always complaining,” said Beilschmidt, though whether he meant it in reference to the more audible parts of his house, or in reference to Edelstein, neither man was quite sure.

“What is this...??” Edelstein asked, his voice trailing off as he gazed about the room. Candles lit alongside every wall, and in the center of the floor was a broom lying flat. Like some sort of witchcraft ritual or questionable ceremony was set to take place. As if chanting was needed, oil sprinkled, or a pentagram drawn to surround the broom.

“I found it,” Beilschmidt said.

And the ghost lingered on the far side of the room. Grinning as Edelstein took two more steps before ceasing his approach.

“Looks like you’re going to try and bring it to life!” said Edelstein. 

Beilschmidt laughed, and lunged down from his hiding place; an hour spent perched amongst the rafters. The sound of his boots hitting the floor with a thud caused Edelstein to gasp. 

“Wouldn’t you like that?” Beilschmidt teased. “A magic broom to do all your chores for you!!” And his body could be seen, as he marched towards the center of the room. A silhouette of a man, tall and lean, with long legs, and even the laces of his combat boots grew visible as Edelstein eyed Beilschmidt from the floor-up, tracing every inch as the white fog gained shape and clarity; each line becoming more and more pronounced. 

As Edelstein’s gaze reached Beilschmidt’s face, however, the vision seemed faded. “Why can’t I see the most important part of you??” 

Beilschmidt stopped his trek towards Edelstein, and shrugged. The sudden rise and fall of his shoulders was seen, but his face and his expression remained a mystery. Like a painting the artist never blessed with features or fine details. Only a sketch of a soldier, born from a brush dipped in white acrylics, then diluted by water. Soft edges, and gentle strokes, ‘til only a blot, in the shape of a man, remained. Ah, except for the uniform and boots. Those looked to be painted by a heavier hand. Even medals or insignias appeared on his chest: an iron cross, an eagle with its wings spread; they almost seemed to shine in the multitude of candlelight. 

“I forgot...” began Edelstein, but he didn’t want to finish. A question to ask, but he didn’t want to ask it! “The way you’re dressed...” he interjected, and continued to trail in and out. “...I wonder if that’s how it always is.” 

“Hmm?” sounded Beilschmidt, and his boots scuffed across the floorboards as he resumed a slow pace in the direction of the broom en route to the man on the other side of the object. “You mean my uniform?” he guessed. “I think we’re all stuck wearing them for as long as we’re here.” 

“I suppose that’s what I meant,” Edelstein said, his voice a bit sheepish. “But when I...” -- and he almost said ‘die’ but decided to say ‘go’ -- first clearing his throat, “when I _go_ , surely I won’t wear a uniform.” His words rattled out in a shaky tone. Watching the ghost grow closer, and waiting for the sight of cheekbones, a jawline, eyes of any color...hoping for a more realistic face to stare into. “Does someone wear the clothes they were wearing when...” he finally dared to ask, yet again, failed to finish. Omitting any word or phrase he feared might cause an upset. 

“Maybe it’s the clothes a person is buried in,” Beilschmidt said. “I know what you’re getting at, though, Fussy Pants,” and his grin was finally wide enough and close enough to be witnessed by Edelstein, who stood a few inches from the broom’s head, while Beilschmidt stepped right past the tip of its handle. “The clothes I died in and the clothes I was buried in are one in the same.” 

“I figured as much,” said Edelstein, and he shut his eyes, for the grin without any eyes or a nose seemed an unnerving sight. He rubbed his arms with brisker motions in hopes of warming himself. “I mean, surely you wore a uniform when...THAT happened. Plus, for your funeral.” 

“I didn’t have a funeral,” Beilschmidt blurted. “Now why don’t we talk about this broom, instead, huh? Ah! And how awesome I am for having found it!!” he laughed. “Wouldn’t that be more fun??”

Edelstein felt a hand atop his own -- one on the right, and then one on the left; both his hands being touched -- and he opened his eyes to find Beilschmidt standing directly in front of him!

Peering up straight into the slightest hint of two eyes, “Ha,” Edelstein breathed out deep, almost in shock, but still near to a laugh, as if unsure as how else to react. Last night, the full vision of Beilschmidt -- as full as a ghost can appear to a mortal -- was not enough to brace Edelstein for this second manifestation. Third, if you count the gray vision Edelstein had beheld that morning, but Edelstein didn't count it, for somehow the gray spirit seemed muted and therefore less 'alive' than the full-force white one.

And now, due to the closer proximity, the added jolt of being touched by the misty hands, the way Beilschmidt stared back at him with a strange sort of longing in his candlelit expression, “You can’t do that without warning!” Edelstein shouted, and his voice broke into a whimper, “I mean...you scared me,” and he turned his face away while adding, “and I don’t want to be scared of you. Not ever.”

Beilschmidt retreated his hands, and stepped back a few inches. His grin disappeared, yet a tight-lipped mouth remained, along with hurt eyes and the rest of his pale features. “You said you wanted to see the most important part of me,” he sulked, and with the sleeve of his colorless uniform, he brushed wisps of silver hair from his forehead, thus revealing a circular scar. The remnants of a deep wound created by a well-aimed bullet. Most of which was still embedded, if not in the ghost, at least in the corpse. “I’ll never do it again,” he promised.

“Just warn me the next time you plan to touch me,” Edelstein said, his words slow and soft. He glanced up expecting to see Beilschmidt still standing near the broom, but instead he found him kneeling on the floor, as if praying. The broomstick aligned with the captain's knees. “Earlier today, I knew you were going to touch me. I knew you were going to hold my hand. But this time...” Edelstein struggled to explain, “I had no idea you were already so close, and your eyes...” he stammered, “it’s hard to look into them.” 

“Don’t then,” seethed Beilschmidt, and he shushed Edelstein with a wave of his hand, or perhaps he was dismissing him from the room which housed only a broom and a dozen candles. -- Yes, it proved to be an illustrated request for Edelstein to leave, for soon Beilschmidt’s wave reverted to a single finger pointed at the exit. -- His head bowed, he added, “Why don’t you go and see what I did downstairs.” 


	10. Chapter 10

Edelstein abandoned the room, leaving behind the sight of the broom and Beilschmidt kneeling down to it. Unsure as to whether or not he should pull the door shut behind him, Edelstein lingered a moment on the threshold. “I won’t be angry, will I?” he asked, almost as an afterthought to Beilschmidt’s claim of having done something downstairs. “You didn’t go through my things, did you??”

“Yeah,” came Beilschmidt’s voice, yet it seemed further away than it should have...assuming the ghost was still manifested in the center of the room. “I found your vast collection of underwear! Just what kind of a guy keeps thirty-six pairs of boxer shorts in a suitcase lined with purple silk?!”

Edelstein gasped as if offended, but had to force even that, for he soon laughed at his own choice in luggage; his own odd habits. “You never mind what I packed,” he feigned an angry tone. Lifting his chin, he finally turned back to glance over his shoulder, only to find Beilschmidt was indeed no longer visible by the broomstick.

Instead, Edelstein watched as each candle was blown out by an unseen roamer of the room. The ghost of Captain Beilschmidt wandering about, extinguishing each flame with his breath or perhaps the tips of his fingers.

Edelstein squinted, finding it harder to see in the room with only a few candles left burning. “I’ll thank you not to do any more snooping,” he said, only half-teasing. “Are you coming down with me?” he asked, and grabbed a hold of the edge of the door, sort of rocking it back and forth, like a kid too scared to leave the room alone. “I’d like it if you did.”

The confession added as the last flame went dead.

The room dark, and Beilschmidt’s footfalls echoed like a man stomping to rid his soles of mud. “I can’t,” he said, and the pounding of boots ceased. “I’ve spent too much time down there already.”

“What possible difference should it make??” Edelstein asked, honest to God baffled by the explanation. “I mean really,” he scoffed. “It’s still your house, isn’t it? I don’t understand why you can’t join me.”

“Listen, Fussy Pants,” Beilschmidt admitted, “I don’t understand it either, but that’s how it is, all right?”

And a long buzzing ring of a doorbell interrupted his speech.

“See? Now you won’t need me,” Beilschmidt said, but his words were rushed and worried. “Company already,” he derided. “You must be popular.”

“Well you know who I am...you heard the agent last night!” Edelstein snapped, and he let go the door’s edge to march into the hall. “As if I know who it could be,” he muttered to himself, thinking Beilschmidt had asked who the caller was, but of course the ghost had not inquired. He knew damn well who was at the door, or he knew within seconds; he knew long before Edelstein knew, for the ghost flew from the room in an instant.

Up through the attic and out onto the roof, Beilschmidt hovered near the shingles, clinging tight to them while peering down onto the yard. A useless action, for the awning of the porch blocked his view. And so he scaled the house, like the rainwater dripping down: all in one fluid motion; a speck of dust as it gets sucked into a low-lying vacuum. No longer the size and shape of a man; no longer a colorless entity drawn out in a near-perfect likeness of the soldier who once lived, but now an orb of white light, trailing down to spy whoever stood upon the porch.

“I’m coming!” Edelstein shouted as he reached the stairs and grasped the banister. Tracing his fingers down the slick wood railing. All out of breath from racing from the dark room and through the candlelit hall. Upon the last step of the stairs, he damn near lost his balance, sort of swaying like a drunk as he steadied himself in the foyer. “I’m coming!” he repeated, for now whoever had rang the bell was knocking on the front door. “It better be important...” Edelstein fumed in a whisper, then fretted, “I hope it’s not the real estate agent.”

Fearing, perhaps, a problem had been discovered with Edelstein’s paperwork, or maybe due to his paying in cash. “It’s not like it’s counterfeit,” Edelstein rambled to himself as he scooted towards the door. “Yes, who is it?” he spoke loud enough for the visitor to hear him.

Or so he thought. -- Having not received a response, “I asked, Who is it??” Edelstein yelled this time.

No peephole. No nearby window. And so he tried peeking through the crack between the door and the frame.

A voice from the front porch answered: “It’s me! I mean...” a young man stammered, “Your neighbor!” And he laughed, “I live next door.” 

Edelstein stood a moment trying to decide how to present himself to this stranger. After all, a man only gets one first impression. ‘I’ll have to live next to this fellow for the rest of my days,’ he warned himself, and...

“Yes, I...think I’ve heard of you,” Edelstein said, as he let his hand linger above the knob. Believing it must be the 'friendly' neighbor, as Beilschmidt had described him. The one with the red and green and white house, like an Italian flag, and ah -- as Edelstein had discovered -- an accent to match. “I’m sorry to have kept you waiting,” Edelstein said, as he clicked the lock, and turned the knob; opening the door to find a man who looked a bit more Irish than Italian. Fair auburn hair, and an impish grin. One Beilschmidt would surely appreciate. Along with a half-shut gaze, as if peering not at Edelstein’s face, but at a bright light burning his eyes. “And what can I do for you this evening?” Edelstein inquired, as if speaking to a patron at a fancy restaurant; as if Edelstein was some high-class waiter. “Won’t you come in?”

‘Be seated, and I’ll fix dinner for us,’ he might as well have continued. Turning his back to the man to lead him inside. “I’m afraid the place is quite messy...” Edelstein began, but soon learned it was a lie. Peering about the once-crowded foyer, shocked to find it was clear of all boxes! “Where did he put my things?!” Edelstein shouted, and behind him, the young Italian whimpered.

“Me??” the friendly neighbor whined.

“No, of course not you!” Edelstein snapped, and scolded himself for it. Trying to redeem himself, “I was talking about...my roommate,” he corrected in the sweetest tone Beilschmidt had ever heard Edelstein use.

Oh yes, the ghost overheard him, for Captain Beilschmidt -- after floating onto the porch to spy the identity of the visitor -- had waited to watch the scene unfold. A small dot of light unnoticed by the two living men. A faint glowing circle hovering right near the threshold.

“Roommate?” the Italian asked, and his hands began to flail about as he spoke; gesturing towards Edelstein and towards the walls of the foyer. “I didn’t know you had someone living with you here!” he seemed to beam, perhaps excited over the prospect of having more than one new neighbor. “Word around town is,” he whispered in an excited tone, as if sharing a bit of gossip, “you moved here alone,” and he pointed to himself while laughing, “A cool single guy like me!”

“Well, not quite,” Edelstein smiled while nodding. Saying ‘not quite’ in reference to the whole ‘cool’ part of the Italian’s line. “I am alone, and...single, I guess you’d call it,” and suddenly Edelstein felt silly for talking about his personal life; the odd sound of his own voice, as if he were advertising himself in a newspaper classified in the hopes of finding a date!

Clearing his throat, Edelstein shut his eyes, and blindly fussed with his cravat. “I'm a bachelor, and I don’t have any family, if that’s what you mean.”

“Oh,” said the Italian, his tone disappointed, rubbing the toe of one shoe at the floor. A drop of rain dripped from a long curl swirling out from the few fringes of reddish hair which framed his face. “Then who is your roommate??”

“I...” Edelstein began yet ended, inhaling a deep breath as if ready to unleash a long diatribe explaining the situation. Instead, he opened his eyes and studied the sight of the young man in his foyer. Trying to think of some reason to shoo him away, lest Edelstein continue to make a fool of himself and a mess of the situation in general.

“It’s...” he reattempted to explain, but only exhaled as if frustrated. “I can’t really tell you,” he finally said.

“Well,” said the Italian, and raised his finger in the air, admitting in singsong, “I have a pretty good guess who it is!!” As he flashed a wide smile, “You can tell me, Mr. New Neighbor. Trust me!” he chimed, then reverted to his gossipy whisper, “I can keep a secret.”

Edelstein stifled any sign of amusement, and also managed to hide his slight annoyance with the ploy. “I told you, I can’t,” he explained. “And you said you have a good guess, so out with it,” Edelstein directed with a wild wave of his own hand. “If you know his name, just say it.”

‘Ah! Like a quiz show!!” the Italian gushed, thinking playtime had commenced, and he bounced around as if standing upon an unseen trampoline. “It’s Captain Beilschmidt, isn’t it?!” the Italian sang out. “I know it’s him! I’ve seen him, too!!” And the Italian clapped his hands as if he had won the game and was entitled to a prize. “Good guess, right? I know it’s the answer! Please tell me it’s him.”

“Of course it is,” Edelstein said; a flat delivery, and he cringed. “I’m not sure why you’re so excited, though. Most people are terrified of ghosts.”

“Oh, but I like Captain Beilschmidt!” the Italian cooed. “He’s always playing funny tricks on me.”

“He is...” Edelstein meant to ask, but instead fell victim to the aforementioned amusement. The way the Italian spoke was more animated and livelier than anyone Edelstein ever met, and how one person could find Beilschmidt a positive topic of discussion was fascinating to him now. Realizing, perhaps, not everyone was scared away by this unnerving ghost of a war captain, but instead found him akin to the way Edelstein found him; dare he think it -- a charming existence? A ghost who plays tricks, and no, Edelstein wasn’t surprised to hear it. Curious, however, to hear a few examples listed, yet he let himself remain silent while trying to make sense of how and when and why Beilschmidt played these so-called tricks. ‘Does he leave the house after all?’ Edelstein wondered. ‘Only at night?' -- 'Can he haunt other homes??’

The Italian opened his eyes wide enough to check on Edelstein, who stood lost in thought. “You all right, Mr. New Neighbor?” he asked, sort of tiptoeing his way closer to the man. “I didn’t upset you, did I??” he cried out as if panicked. “Ah! I didn’t mean to, if I did!!” And the Italian reached out, patting Edelstein on the shoulder. The door still wide open, and the sound of rain beating atop the roof and awning, dripping from the overhang, pattering against the dirt patches in the yard, creating mud, lent a nice background melody to the tapping hand.

“Would you like to join me for tea?” asked Edelstein, offering a warm drink out of nowhere. Thinking the rain needed company...thinking HE needed company. Wondering where on earth the ghost of Captain Beilschmidt had gone to. “I would ask my roommate to join us, but the way you speak of him, perhaps he’d spit in our tea.”

“Oh, he’d never do that!” the Italian smiled. “But can’t you find maybe a bottle of wine instead??” he asked, a sheepish quality to his request, yet he winked unashamed. “I’m not wild about tea, Mister...” and he almost repeated the matter-of-fact nickname. His words halted mid-speech thanks to a distraction. A small white light sailing past him in the foyer. Not much bigger than a single bulb plucked from a strand of Christmas lights; a definite brightness yet blurred about its edges; escaped from the wire yet still able to glow despite a lack of electricity.

The orb flew past the Italian’s face and on towards Edelstein. Coin-sized spot of light floating near his ear before darting off down the hall, and shooting up the stairs; thus Beilschmidt disappeared.

Edelstein shuddered. “I thought it was a moth at first!” he spat. “I...think he whispered something to me.”

“Don’t be silly,” said the Italian. “Ghosts can’t talk!”

And he laughed, raising his hands in order to dismiss Edelstein’s statement. “I always see Captain Beilschmidt like a shiny ping-pong ball!”

“Ah,” sounded Edelstein, and he couldn’t help but grin. “I do too. I’m sorry. How silly of me,” he blurted out the string of excuses, yet welled with pride in knowing the friendly neighbor had never heard the ghost speak, nor seen his spectral body. “I must be imagining things,” Edelstein said, and stepped to the front door in order to shut it. “I’m afraid you’ll have to add one more thing to my list of forgetfulness,” he admitted, while leading the Italian through the hall, and motioning towards the kitchen. “I don’t have any tea or wine. Only milk.”


	11. Chapter 11

Edelstein and the Italian entered the kitchen as Beilschmidt sought refuge in the attic. Searching the space for the key again, while the two living men downstairs heard a few dull metallic 'clunks' and 'clinks', as if Beilschmidt was now emptying a bag of rusted tools onto the floor overhead. 

“Gosh,” said the Italian, as he glanced to the ceiling, “I hope the captain isn’t dragging chains these days. Ah! You know...like the ghost in that Christmas story." Nodding in a slow dramatic way, thus illustrating the solemness of his assumption; applying fiction-based logic to explain how Beilschmidt must be damned, akin to Jacob Marley. “You don’t think he is, do you?!” whined the Italian. “Dragging chains, I mean??”

“No,” laughed Edelstein, and he shook his head. “Of all the silly things...”

Opening the fridge, Edelstein retrieved the milk, and teased, “Besides, how could a shiny ping-pong ball drag chains?” 

The only man in the room who knew it was a joke, but it pleased him to turn around and find the Italian smiling. 

“Phew!” said the Italian, and he rubbed his wrist to his forehead. Laughing at his own mistake, “You’re right!” and he opened one eye as if the upcoming confession warranted it, “I guess I’m kind of a ditz sometimes.” 

Edelstein, now preoccupied with his struggle to open the milk bottle, glanced up from his grasp atop the lid, and peered over to the Italian, surprised to see the brief smile of relief had so quickly given way to such a pained expression on his face. “It’s fine,” said Edelstein, and he toyed with the notion of telling the Italian the truth. How yes, Beilschmidt could be damned, _if God so choose_ \-- if he suddenly deemed it fit -- and the captain could be forced to carry weight or drag about chains, since he was indeed able to manifest into the actual image of a man; the soldier he was on earth, and no, he didn’t always appear as a mere glowing orb. 

But for whatever reason, Edelstein kept the secret. Although it wasn’t his secret alone. The real estate agent knew...

'Or does he?’ Edelstein wondered. Thinking perhaps the agent had only heard Beilschmidt. Perhaps he had never seen him, especially in 'full force'; haunting his home as a full-blown apparition. -- Had the other people who toured the home seen similar? Or did they too only see Beilschmidt like the Italian saw him: as the so-called shiny ping-pong ball?? 

“Here, let me,” said the Italian, and he reached out his hands while approaching the fridge. Grabbing the cold bottle of milk from Edelstein’s weak grasp, “I can be good for something, at least!” the Italian beamed. 

Cracking open the lid, he handed the bottle back to Edelstein.

“Voila!” the Italian said, and licked the underside of the lid before tossing it into the sink. 

“That’s not a trash can,” Edelstein sniffed, but otherwise ignored the Italian’s strange actions. Tempted to ask if the milk tasted all right -- safe to drink, or if the lady who sold it to him had kept it out of the freezer too long, while stashing it in the storeroom...hiding it to take home for herself, but ah, everyone has a price, don’t they? Who needs dairy when they can have cash -- but Edelstein realized he could just smell the milk in order to tell for himself. 

Yet he didn’t. 

Holding the bottle in his hands, wishing it was a pitcher of tea, or hell, even the bottle of wine the Italian spoke of prior to their entering the kitchen, “I wish I had some nice glasses unpacked for us to drink out of,” Edelstein said, “but I’m afraid whatever Captain Beilschmidt has left behind will have to do.” 

Assuming there was a cabinet somewhere in that room which held drinking glasses. “Probably dusty...” Edelstein muttered, as he set the bottle to the countertop and began rummaging, “I checked these earlier today, and I don’t think I saw any, but...” he stretched up, opening a cabinet door high above the stove, “maybe in here?” he struggled to say, for he stood on tiptoes, batting his hand into the confines of the highest cabinet. “I can’t see,” he added, and fell back to standing flatfooted, huffing as he tugged at his shirt. “Hmph!” he sounded, and pointed to the opened cabinet. “Can you see in there?” he asked the Italian. “I know I’m taller than you, but still...” 

“Well,” said the Italian, tilting his head to peer upwards, “I can’t see either, but I tell you what, Mr. New Neighbor, how about I climb on top of the counter here, and I can stand up and look for you. Ah!” he bounced around, “or you could call Captain Beilschmidt to come and get some cups for us!! I know HE can reach!”

“You know,” mocked Edelstein. “I find it hard to believe you think Beilschmidt can’t talk and could be shackled by chains, yet you think he can fly down here, grab glasses from a cabinet, and hand them to us??” Scoffing at the Italian’s ever-changing logic, yet he tried to keep his tone calm, lest the Italian mope again over his own assumed ditziness. Not wanting to see the otherwise happy-go-lucky guy fall victim to self-doubt and self-inflicted insults again. His smile too nice to form into a frown, complete with puckered chin, as if he were about to burst into tears. Hell, even the half-shut eyes were a greater comfort to Edelstein than the sight of the Italian when he opened a single eye; perhaps in the hope of witnessing Edelstein’s reaction should he actually display one. As if the Italian calling himself names would bring either a look of agreement from Edelstein, or a look of ‘Oh don’t be silly! I’m sure you’re not a ditz,' and the Italian had wanted at least one eye open in order to see it. 

A moment ago, the Italian was more than ready to scurry onto the countertop like a child in search of a cookie jar hidden on the highest shelf, yet now, the Italian shrugged and seemed distracted by the exit. Staring at the kitchen door as if wanting to run through it, and leave the kitchen and this new neighbor behind. “I...” he struggled to defend himself, “I kinda lied to you, Mr. Edelstein."

“You know my name...” Edelstein meant to ask, but he wasn’t all that curious as to why the Italian pretended to not know; unless of course he wasn't pretending, and was only using a nickname to be friendly. Rather childish person, the Italian seemed, and apparently dishonest, too. “What do you mean you lied??” And now he was asking, and Edelstein narrowed his eyes. “About not seeing the captain as a ball of light all the time?" he assumed, and he started to scream; his hands on his hips, “I figured as much! You’ve heard him and you’ve seen him, and yet...!!” 

“I’m sorry,” said the Italian. “I got your name from someone in town. They told me a famous person moved in, so I was all excited!” The Italian’s explanation blurted, and dripping with enthusiasm, yet he touched his hand to his heart, as if halfway through his confession, he already felt a weight lifted. “I decided to pay you a little visit! It’s been a year since I’ve stepped foot in here, and...I thought maybe you could use a friend.” 

“Yes, well,” Edelstein huffed, “that’s nice of you and everything, but what about Beilschmidt’s ghost? What about your lie??” 

“Hmm?” asked the Italian, as if he had forgot. “Oh that,” he laughed. Scratching his head a moment before admitting, “I guess I didn’t want you to know what I know about him. That’s all, Mr. Edelstein. I swear it.”

“What do you know that I don’t know?!” Edelstein demanded, though the prospect of hearing an answer terrified him. 

The Italian stepped forward, and with wide eyes, he whispered, “The captain is a bad spirit, Mr. Edelstein. He plays jokes, and he floats around when he’s feeling sneaky, but when he gets mad...”

The lights in the kitchen went out in an instant, and the sound of a thud overhead caused the two men to gasp. 


	12. Chapter 12

In the pitch-black kitchen, the Italian threw his arms around Edelstein and hugged him. Or, at least, it was some action akin to a hug. Sort of hanging on for dear life. Don’t let me drown. If I’m going down, you’re going down with me.

A father and son they almost appeared to be. Near-equals in age, yet the Italian looked and acted so much younger. Standing in the dark, however -- in that moment, if anyone could actually see them; no light shone from the single uncovered window above the sink -- they clung together, the Italian cowering at every manic sound made in the attic space. Boots stomping as if the ghost of Captain Beilschmidt was crazed with the notion of some bad word being spoken against him in the midst of his new friend. His new...whatever Edelstein was to him by then. “I guess I shouldn’t have said anything,” the Italian whispered. Frightened and desperate, he continued the hug, and buried his face in Edelstein’s shirt; his cheek nestled against the white cravat. “You think he’d turn the lights back on if we asked him pretty please with cannoli on top?” 

“I think he’s a coward and should stop toying with the electricity!” Edelstein hissed. “You damn fool...” he seethed, and the Italian whimpered. 

“No, not you!” Edelstein clarified, petting at the Italian’s head, if only for a split second. “I didn’t mean you,” he added in a softer tone, and at least wrapped one arm around the Italian, squeezing him to return the hug. 

“Who did you mean, then?!” a voice boomed from the cracks in the ceiling. 

“You know exactly who I mean!” Edelstein screamed. “Of all the silly things!!” 

The lights clicked on and off again fast enough in frequency to cause a seizure, should anyone with photosensitive epilepsy be unlucky enough to witness Beilschmidt’s current little ‘game’. 

But neither man in the room was too sensitive to it; least not of all the Italian who stood with his eyes squinted. 

“Stop that!!” Edelstein said, and pulled away from the Italian so as not to startle him further, nor confuse him, since all of Edelstein's anger was directed at the ghost. “I said stop it!” he demanded again, and covered his eyes with one hand, and with the other, made a fist, shaking it like a cranky old man yelling at some damn kid to get off his lawn. “You want me to make friends, don’t you?” he asked, and the volume of his cries to the ghost overhead remained high, yet his overall demeanor shifted into something more sincere. “I can’t just be friends with you, now can I?? A man and a ghost!” he scoffed; laughing as if knowing who the only fool in the house truly was. “I can’t spend my whole life with you if you continue to act like a sulking brat!!” 

“Well who asked you to,” said Beilschmidt, and the flickering ceased. 

His final line of the evening called out through the cracks in the ceiling, and it reached Edelstein’s ears as flat and defeated. A heartless quality. 

Edelstein said, as if awaking from a trance, “Well I thought YOU did.” The words drawn out in slow motion. He uncovered his eyes and unclenched his fist; lowering his hands to let his arms hang limp at his sides. “I guess I was wrong.” 

The Italian sniffled; tears forming in his half-shut eyes, and he bowed his head as if sorry for something he may have done to cause the scene. “I...I think I’ll go home now, Mr. Edelstein, if that’s all right,” he stammered. “You can come over to my place one night, and we’ll have that drink.” 

Edelstein nodded a quick sign of agreement, and tried to force a smile.

“I’d like that,” he said like a machine. An automated recording set to play when needed. Proper and dignified, always! “It was very nice meeting you,” he continued as if reading from a cue card held up by Emily Post. “You’re more than welcome to visit me any time you like.” And he reached out his palm as if the two would shake hands before parting ways, yet...

The Italian grabbed Edelstein’s arm. “Walk me back to the front door,” he begged. “It won’t take long,” he laughed. “Just a nice little walk, and we’ll pretend you-know-who isn’t watching.” 

Edelstein finally smiled, but this time out of sympathy for his real life new friend. “You’re fine,” he said, taking notice of a tear as it streamed down the Italian’s cheek. “I mean...you’re quite right. How rude of me not to escort you.” 

Edelstein bent his arm to make the Italian’s hold upon it less awkward. Even patting at the Italian’s hand placed at the crook of Edelstein’s elbow. “I’m sorry our evening became...”

“Super scary!” the Italian interrupted. 

Edelstein shushed him, but tried to make it sound polite. 

The two walked as casual as a couple of lifelong allies out for a stroll in a park somewhere. Exiting the kitchen, and rambling down the hall to reach the foyer. 

“I can’t help but wonder,” Edelstein began, as the two stopped and stood only inches from the front door, “why you claimed to like Captain Beilschmidt if he scares you so much.” 

The Italian didn’t respond. He let go Edelstein’s arm, and fidgeted about before sticking his hands in his pockets. Sniffling, and unfazed, it seemed, by the tears trickling off his cheeks.

“Was that a lie too?” Edelstein asked.

And without much thought to his own actions, he pulled at his cravat, loosening it in systematic motions until it was freed from his neck. 

Edelstein took a step forward, and dabbed the fabric at the Italian’s face. 

“Quick,” he whispered. “Go on and tell me. I doubt he can hear us now.” 

The Italian shook his head 'no', and withdrew his right hand, lifting it to stop Edelstein from drying his tears. Taking the cravat into his own grasp, as if hoping for a souvenir. “Didn’t you ever have someone in your life you really loved?" asked the Italian, “I mean really, REALLY loved, and once they were gone, you clung to anyone who reminded you of them??” Sniffling again, he spoke on in a melancholic tone while pulling the cravat close to his mouth, as if hoping to hide his lips. -- Sure, Edelstein and maybe even Beilschmidt could hear him, but at least they couldn’t see the source of the confession; mouth to pronounce the words, yet surely the source was a broken heart and a tired soul; who would ever know it based on his usual exuberant self? -- “I like Captain Beilschmidt because he reminds me of the time I knew his brother,” the Italian admitted. “When I was a kid, I thought the world of them both.” 

Edelstein smiled, and it wasn’t forced or failed; it wasn’t born out of sympathy, either. He smiled out of kinship.

“I knew them when I was a kid, too,” he said. 

The Italian opened both eyes, and lowered the cravat from his mouth. “You knew my Beilschmidt??” he asked.

Edelstein’s smile grew wider. “I knew him better than I knew my own.” 

***

The Italian walked home, alone in the rain, still clinging tight to the cravat freed from the Austrian’s neck. It smelt of soap and ‘clean’ and all the ideas of a famous man now living in the haunted house next to him. “A friend,” the Italian said. “My first real friend in almost a decade.” 

He entered his own home, and stepped past a mess scattered about the floor until he reached his room, trudging with heavy steps, to toss himself upon the bed. Crying with the cravat drawn to his chest, he fell asleep without a dream, nor anyone to keep him company. An otherwise empty bed. A room bleak with blank canvases. Untouched paint-sets. Brushes in a pile near a diary unkept. 

***

Edelstein had watched the Italian drift away in the darkness, once exiting the front door and lingering on the porch a moment. How the Italian had turned to him with a slight wave before scurrying down the steps and crossing the lawn as if it wasn’t raining at all. No running. No covering his head. Just a young man with tears on his face, and a cravat in his hand. 

“My best one,” Edelstein remarked to himself as he shut the door and locked it. “I suppose it doesn’t matter,” and he exhaled as if exhausted. 

Glancing up to the ceiling, he leaned his back to the door and stood there, one hand still resting on the knob, and the other smoothing at his shirt where he felt a cravat should be. As if something was missing; something less obvious than a necktie.

“Are you still awake up there?” he asked the ceiling. 

No answer came, and so Edelstein hummed, not Ode to Joy, but a song he had wrote a few months prior to his moving into Beilschmidt’s home. The last song he had wrote in the now dead year. “Nineteen Fifty-Five,” Edelstein noted the current year aloud, as if he had forgot it was January First. A holiday: two in a row. The start of a new year, in a new house; the fresh start he had so desperately longed for. “I needed you tonight, and you failed me,” he said, turning his mind back to the ghost. 

Candles still lit in the hallway upstairs. An attic emptied of the spirit the Italian dubbed ‘bad’. 

Edelstein tried to make sense of the description, as he finally eased away from the front door, and made his way to the slender closet in the foyer. In search of his suitcases. “You must have hid them somewhere...” he spoke to Beilschmidt but could sense the ghost was nowhere around. “I’d like to think you've already unpacked for me,” he sort of teased, and opened the door to find nothing. 

“Hmm,” said Edelstein, and he lifted his gaze to find even the briefcase and paperwork missing from the top shelf. “You damn thief!” he scolded. “What on earth would a ghost need with money?! With MY important papers?!!” 

He slammed the closet door shut, and huffed in vexation. “I’m starting to see why he called you that!” Edelstein fumed in reference to the Italian's negative interpretation.

Tromping through the hallway like a kid on the brink of a massive tantrum, Edelstein snatched his coat from the chair Beilschmidt had built. Wanting in that instant to bust the chair to pieces in order to make firewood. The house chilled by the wet night air, and winter none too friendly to such an old and drafty house. “I’m starting to hate this place...” Edelstein muttered to himself. 


	13. Chapter 13

With his coat in hand, Edelstein continued his trek through the hall. An angered quest to find his belongings. Wanting to go to bed soon, but in need of his pajamas, he pulled the coat onto his body, and turned a sharp corner near the kitchen entrance.

That's where he discovered the door to the parlor. An open arch of a doorway, and past it he spied a large blue armchair, a fireplace -- ‘Perfect!’ he thought, and smirked over the repeated notion of burning the handcrafted chair from the hall -- and several pictures on the wall: hanging and framed, with faces too far away to decipher the identities of those photographed. And one single oil painting loomed heavy above the mantel. A large gold frame housing a canvas with a man depicted in a faded uniform. 

“Looks like a soldier’s den all right,” Edelstein spoke aloud yet kept his voice quiet for fear Beilschmidt would overhear him. 

Not wanting to be scolded for snooping, ‘Just a quick peek,’ Edelstein decided.

And he traced his fingers up and down the arched doorway before finally braving to step foot inside the room. All dark save for a strange lantern upon the mantel. It didn’t look to be lit by any flame. Not gas nor electric. A cold quality to its muted glow; the internal cavity filled with some substance Edelstein could not quite make out from his vantage point; his position, still several feet away from the fireplace. He stopped and stood in the center of the room, and placed his hands upon the back of the chair, feeling the upholstery. Spying a stain on one arm. 

“You drank coffee here, and made a mess,” he said as if reminiscing about a scene he himself never witnessed, yet it appeared clear in his mind as if he had been there, a dozen or so years ago, crouched at Beilschmidt’s side. Sitting upon the floor, and knitting, or mending, or playing with a kitty. Like a quaint little housewife. “I remember...I saw it clearly...” he said, and felt prone to speaking on in quasi-rhymes, as if writing poetry based on fiction, yet it seemed so real it ached his mind to realize it was fantasy. “You never cared for coffee, yet you drank it,” he said of Beilschmidt’s lifelong activity of choking down coffee, daily, and at night, how he’d sit in his parlor, facing a painting on the wall. 

“You thought he moved...thought he blinked at you! And it frightened you,” Edelstein explained of the man in the painting, and the ‘why’ of the stain. How the coffee was spilled. “All over your lap, and you jumped up and cursed,” Edelstein laughed. “I remember this room...” 

A place he had never ventured to, prior to that moment, but a sense akin to déjà vu intertwined with a feeling of nostalgia for a scene he never shared overcame him. 

“I remember it well,” he noted to himself, and took one last look at the stained arm of the chair before glancing up to the pictures on the wall. Sure enough, a cuckoo clock hung silenced nearby. 

Edelstein approached the clock, and placed his hands on its hands. Wanting to move time forward...wanting to move it back. He stood tempted to swirl the hands in one direction or the other, but couldn’t decide, and instead let go to open the small gate. Peering inside the cabinet-like space, he spied a yellow bird. “That man and his birds,” Edelstein smiled. “I bet you miss chiming every hour of the day and night,” he said to the bird, and the feeling of a breeze rushed past him. A kick to the back of the knees, or so it seemed, for Edelstein swayed forward an inch, and a pain shot upwards through his back; standing stiff so as not to fall face-first into the clock’s face. A similar creature. Faces, and hands, and an inability to keep track of time. No going forward and no going back. Stuck in place, and Edelstein breathed out deep. “It's about time you joined me,” he said to whom he sensed was Beilschmidt, yet Edelstein couldn’t help but shift his attention to the oil painting above the mantel. The portrait of the old man seemed to glare in return. “I wish you’d stop watching me,” he said to the painting, “and I wish you could still sing,” he said to the bird, “and if you are here, Captain Beilschmidt, then I wish you would speak.” 

All of his wishes bestowed upon three entities. One inanimate, one dead and still not present, and one just a creation born from an artist’s hand.

Edelstein wandered away from the clock to embark upon his original plan: to study the photographs in frames. Hung in an odd pattern, and Edelstein squinted his eyes to see faces in the darkness. Beilschmidt’s parlor lit only by the unusual lantern. How it seemed to emit a flickering sound, yet the light was constant and unmoving. Muted, but sustained. 

In one photograph, Edelstein spotted two men with their arms around each other. Hands atop shoulders, and they too were dressed as soldiers. “You and your brother,” he said. “The two Beilschmidts,” and he grinned. “I can’t remember your first name...” he realized of the eldest brother.

But the younger of the two brothers: Edelstein knew his name well. A man with blue eyes and blond hair, and Edelstein harbored quite a crush on the younger brother, when he himself was a kid. “I never thought he cared much for me,” Edelstein began, “but then again, perhaps he was just hard to read.” 

Tilting his head, Edelstein touched his fingertips to the glass atop the photograph. The black-and-white photo seemed to shine silver in the lantern light. When the air in the room went chilly it gave him hope. “I wish you’d stop sulking and join me,” he said, listing yet another request to the dead and still not present. “I can wait all night if I have to.” 

He let his hand slip away from the framed picture. “But I shouldn’t have to,” he added, and the picture fell from the wall. Thudding to the hardwood floor of the parlor, and the glass shattered. Shards landing atop Edelstein’s boots. 

“Damn it!” he shouted, and jumped back from the mess. “It’s like it flew! I swear it!! I barely touched it,” he defended his action of only wanting to reach out to the two brothers. To the time he knew them, and a time they could never relive.

Edelstein whimpered, and the sound of the buzzing electric hum returned to his ears. Not so much overhead this time, but all around him. The lantern too seemed to sense it, for it grew brighter atop the mantel. The whole room bathed in a silver metallic light. The walls in an instant looked to be constructed of tin, instead of wood, and Edelstein wished he could run upstairs to grab the broom from the otherwise empty room, and come back down to sweep up the broken glass. Fearing, however, the strange buzzing sound. “The last time I heard it,” he tried to recall, “was this afternoon, right before I found you in bed.”

Edelstein again toyed with the idea of racing upstairs, but to check the bedroom for Beilschmidt’s presence. “I can’t think straight!” he screamed. 

The other pictures on the wall seemed to be melting in the glow of the lantern. The walls too thin now to hold them in place. The nails too thick; the frames too heavy. “God, make it stop,” Edelstein said, and breathed in short stints. “I can’t remember anything now...” And his mind went blank. The parlor spun around him; built upon a turntable, and the colors drained to nothing but black-and-white with hints of gray and luminous silver. “I’m gonna be sick,” he cried, and the lantern light swallowed the last shadows of the corners. The whole room bright, and spinning about him as if the house had fallen into a whirlpool. A drain on the ocean floor, and Beilschmidt’s home was a sinking ship made entirely of steel. Metal can’t float with ease, and the wood beams of his home creaked as if someone was marching down the upstairs hall. 

“God, let it be him,” Edelstein begged, and he swayed in place again. A rocking boat, and he struggled to step forward, glass raining from his boots, and crunching under his tiptoes. Back to the array of pictures on the wall, Edelstein chose one face to stare at; one set of eyes to stare into. A picture of Captain Beilschmidt: alone, and grown up. A man in his twenties, with an iron cross on his chest, and his chin raised like the proudest man on earth. Eyes uncolored, due to the sepia tone, yet a hint of red seemed to permeate from them. “I can’t,” Edelstein said, in reference to wanting to reach out and touch the photograph, thinking he’d only break the glass; destroy the reminder of the past, or at least the way it’s displayed. “You look exactly the same,” Edelstein said, and his heart ached to stand there, longing to be near to what might as well have been a figment of his imagination. A fictional character written to keep him company. As if his past two days were but a dream. “I can’t!” he repeated, and yet Edelstein grunted as if fighting a battle with an unseen enemy. Reaching out, he snatched the photo from the wall, removing it from the nail, and he hugged it to his chest. “I hate you,” he said. “I hate you and I hate this house.” 

Whispering to himself a third lie, “I never knew why you didn’t like me.” 

Edelstein, with the portrait of Beilschmidt held tight to his heart, slunk to the floor, to sit like a kid with his legs crossed, punished and told to stay inside for the remainder of his life. No more playtime. No more jump rope with friends. 

“A noose, you said,” Edelstein recalled. “You wanted me to die...”

He withdrew the frame from his chest, and stared down at the portrait of Captain Beilschmidt.

“I guess if I did, you and I would be on the same plane.” 

“Don’t talk like that,” a voice came from the far side of the room. The sound of a match scratching against the fireplace followed, and soon the lantern shifted from a silver glow, to a real flame. Illuminating the parlor with a proper orange light. Beilschmidt’s real face illuminated by the fireside. “Miss me?” he asked.

The translucent yet somewhat white figure of Beilschmidt stood with what appeared to be an actual match in his hand, yet the flame was white, too. Only red on the wick of the lantern. A kerosene lamp, which operated with a mind of its own! Glowing silver when lit by the painting; glowing orange when lit by the ghost. A warm flame rose and bounced off the walls, wooden again in appearance, but of course they were never tin. The room ceased its spinning, and Edelstein sat aghast, mouth agape, with the framed picture on his lap. 

“I don’t ever want to hear you talking like that again,” Beilschmidt said, and he tossed the matchstick into the fireplace. 

A rush of sound like the cracking of twigs met Edelstein’s ears, and he marveled at the sight of a fire budding in the brick cavity. 

“Without any wood or anything,” he sort of rambled to himself. 

“Hmm?” Beilschmidt asked, and glanced down to the fireplace. “Well, of course there’s wood in there, Fussy Pants. You don't think I’d let you freeze down here??”

Edelstein bit his lip as he studied the ghost. The man still dressed in lace-up boots and Luftwaffe uniform. Whitish fog in the shape of the man who hated entering this room, but did so, during his earlier trip downstairs. Once he had lit all the candles, and displayed the broom, Beilschmidt indeed hid the boxes and suitcases, stashing them in an empty room. The briefcase of money and important papers he had carried to the attic to keep safe. Locked door and all, and despite his ability to float through any hard surface and structure, he couldn’t manage to pry the padlock from the attic door. Thus Edelstein’s small fortune and the deed to the house would be untouched by anyone save for a ghost. -- The chores done, and Beilschmidt had even found time, before Edelstein awoke from his nap, to put bulbs in the foyer and kitchen fixtures, and to rid the kitchen cabinets of an ugly spice rack. Breaking it apart, to toss it into the fireplace, along with a few wooden trivets he never cared for, anyway. All used to build a small fire to warm the house for Edelstein on his first night in his new home. 

“I’ll get some real firewood for you someday,” Beilschmidt said. “Kinda hard, when I can’t find an axe.” 

“I suppose you can still use one, though,” Edelstein said, speaking as if lost in thought. “You can light matches,” he noted, and with a sigh he let the framed picture rest flat on his lap as he leaned back on his hands. Arms stiff behind him; his torso and legs creating an obtuse angle once uncrossing his legs and stretching them out straight in front of him. Breathing easy again, a slight smile glimmered on his face. “I thought you said you couldn’t join me down here tonight.” A hint of teasing in his delivery, yet his eyes watered at the continued vision of the ghost near the fireplace. Lingering there, floating an inch from the ground, until every few seconds when the ghost would step down, boots flat on the floor, then repeat; accidental levitating. As if Beilschmidt needed a weight tied about him. Something more than an iron cross at his chest...perhaps iron shackles on his shoulders. Chains, as the Italian feared, clamped about his waist to trail behind him while stomping through the attic space. 

“You said you already spent too much time downstairs...” Edelstein rephrased, and eased his head to one side, and shut his eyes. A bit of relief found in Beilschmidt’s company, but it met with the same old sense of loneliness he felt prior to the haunting. 

“It’s after Midnight now,” Beilschmidt said, and pointed to the clock, despite its face reading the same time for what felt like an eternity. A decade spent with the long hand on twelve, and the short hand on nine, and “I just needed a chance to recharge,” Beilschmidt explained, or actually sort of guessed. Still unsure, after eleven years of death, as to exactly how he functioned; the rules of his existence a mystery even to him, but at least he knew the basics.

“The buzzing sound,” Edelstein assumed, “that must be you regenerating.” 

“I didn’t hear anything,” Beilschmidt said, and placed one hand atop the mantel. Glancing at the oil painting above it...

“What a face to wake up to.” Distracted a moment, then with his free hand, he pointed to the chair, “I used to fall asleep there," he laughed. “Ah, and you know who would wake me up?” he asked. “This guy! Right here...” Beilschmidt motioned to the oil portrait, and trailed off again. His gaze returned to the painting, yet he soon eyed the man on the floor. 

Edelstein remained silent, eyes still shut, and he wiggled his toes, grateful for the thick leather of his brown boots which kept the shattered glass from cutting either foot. “I’m afraid I broke something of yours,” he said, ignoring Beilschmidt’s tall tales. -- Of course an oil painting can’t awake you from sleep! No more than a ghost can light a match, and build a fire from unwanted kitchen accessories?! -- Deciding, in his interim silence, he must be dreaming. Beilschmidt, like Jacob Marley was deemed to be by Ebenezer Scrooge, could be nothing more than undigested food, though in Edelstein’s case, Beilschmidt was more likely created -- if he _were_ a figment of the imagination -- due to a lack of food. An empty stomach causing him to hallucinate. “Or perhaps I’m going crazy,” he said: adding the wrong statement to his previous confession. “I mean,” he stammered, and opened his eyes, casting a worried stare to Beilschmidt, happy to find him still in the same position near the fireplace -- happy to still find him at all! -- “I did break something. I didn’t mean I was crazy for that.” 

“Uh-huh,” said Beilschmidt, nodding like a patronizing therapist. “I know you broke one of my pictures.” And he smirked as he lifted his hand from the mantel, floating away from the fire, before anchoring his footfalls to the wood. Walking as slow as a man traversing through water. As if working his way against an ocean current, he crossed the room, closing the small distance between he and Edelstein. “You couldn’t stand to see me alive, huh?”

“That’s not it at all!” said Edelstein. “It was an accident, I swear it.” 

He lifted his chin to peer up at the ghost looming at his side.

Beilschmidt stared down at him in return before narrowing his eyes at the portrait atop Edelstein’s lap. 

“And that one,” said Beilschmidt. “I guess that’s your proof, huh?” He cringed at the sight of his own face in the photograph. “Didn’t bust that one to pieces, now did you?” he half-joked and half-seethed. 

“I’m not going to,” Edelstein promised. “In fact,” he smiled, and leaned forward, lifting the portrait from his lap, “I want to put this one in the bedroom with me. Right on the nightstand...” 

Beilschmidt groaned a sound of disapproval; sort of grumbling before stating, “I think that’s a bad idea, Fussy Pants,” and he outstretched his hand as if wanting Edelstein to relinquish the picture; to give it up to the ghost, and let him hang it back on the wall of the long-unused parlor where it belonged. Wiggling his fingers as if growing impatient, “You can’t get used to seeing me like that.” 

Edelstein drew the framed picture back to his chest and shook his head ‘no’ like a spoiled child told to hand over his favorite toy.

“Forget it,” he sulked. “I’m keeping it.”

“Like hell you are!” Beilschmidt said, and his outstretched hand clenched into a fist. “You listen to me, Smart Guy. You’ve gotta get used to me like this, and not like some person in a picture, all right? I’m not gonna sit on the nightstand like a portrait of a boyfriend,” he derided with a harsh laugh. “You think you’re some schoolgirl with a postcard of a soldier she wants to get all dreamy-eyed over?! I’m right here, dumbass! You don’t have to keep that stupid thing anywhere except in this stupid parlor!! Let the damn fire have it for all I care!”

“But I like to see you like this,” Edelstein said, his voice weak, and his eyes wet with emerging tears, thanks to Beilschmidt’s loss of temper. Too tired to fight back; too unnerved by the evening’s prior activities -- the surreal outburst from the parlor itself, as if not only the lantern but the room had a mind of its own -- to create and offer any clever banter. “Just listen,” he said, only wanting the truth to be known so the ghost would calm down, “I like to see you as human...”

“But I am human!” said Beilschmidt, and his eyes in the white mist of his face grew more pronounced. Arched eyebrows slanted like sharp arrows above an offended gaze. “You can sleep right next to me, and you won’t wake up to any face, but...you need to get used to that too! Not some picture of me.” And Beilschmidt grumbled again, as if pained by the whole idea, and he knelt down, swooping his arm, finally grabbing the picture from Edelstein’s grasp. 

“Give it back!” Edelstein screamed, but Beilschmidt stomped to the wall, and hung the picture in its former place. 

“Just be glad I’m not burning it,” Beilschmidt said, and he looked over his shoulder to make sure Edelstein was still on the floor. Beilschmidt’s hands holding the frame despite it hanging from a nail, just in case Edelstein jumped up to reclaim the photograph. “And that’s where it’s staying! End of story,” Beilschmidt laughed. “Now you know better, right?” he smirked. Finally letting go the portrait. Crunching glass beneath his own boots as he stomped away from the wall, to take a long look at his display of old pictures. His back turned to Edelstein as he mocked, “Human...what did you think I was? A cat?!” 

“No, you’re a ghost, and I can see right through you,” Edelstein said, matter-of-fact. “I can see you, but you’re hollow,” he sighed. “In the picture, you were flesh and blood, and maybe...” he tried to form the thought, yet it sounded offensive; unable to censor it, “I need to see you as more than just a spirit.”

“I can’t be any more than this,” Beilschmidt said, and the shards of glass brushed past his boots until he reverted to levitating inches from the wood. “You think this is fun for me??”

“No,” said Edelstein, and he shook his head a split second before bowing it. An air of shame as if he were asking too much; expecting too much from a man dead eleven years ago yesterday. -- What could he ask of the dead? To keep him company?? To let him set the portrait on his nightstand, so he could kiss the image and idea of a soldier every morning to feel less alone?! 

“I suppose I should go to bed,” Edelstein said, yet he didn’t move from his spot on the floor. “There’s so much I didn’t do today. I need to make up for it tomorrow,” and he rubbed his eyes while insulting himself, “I’m too lazy.” 

“Listen,” said Beilschmidt, as he returned to looming near Edelstein’s side. Each foot placed soft and silent upon the ground, and he stared down again, hoping Edelstein would uncover his eyes. Waiting for that face to peer up at him. “I worked hard today so you wouldn’t have to,” he said. “But you brought in all your stuff from outside!” he boasted on behalf of Edelstein. “Ha! That wasn’t easy, right? All that stuff, and you’re such a skinny guy. Probably tired you out...no wonder you took a long nap!” Beilschmidt beamed as he rambled on, listing accomplishments while reasoning Edelstein wasn’t lazy, just perhaps a bit weak. “I can be the big strong one, and you can be the, uh...you can be the pretty one, all right? Sound good?? I’ll just let you take it easy, and I’ll do all the work. I like it that way, anyway. I’ll clean, but you might have to cook...hmm, and do the shopping because I can’t seem to go out in the daytime.”

“I figured as much,” sniffled Edelstein, and sure enough, once he uncovered his eyes, he revealed a face full of tears. 

“Hey,” said Beilschmidt, and he reached out his hand as if tempted to pat Edelstein atop the head -- run his fingers through dark hair -- but recoiled as if maybe he shouldn’t. Swallowing hard, he asked, “You’re crying?? What did I do this time?”

Edelstein slid his legs from their outstretched line upon the floor to sit with his legs drawn close to his chest. Leaning forward, and wrapping his arms around his bent knees, “You didn’t do anything,” he said. “I’m just tired, I guess.” 

“You’re lying. You’re still mad at me about the picture, aren’t you?” 

“I’m not,” said Edelstein. “If you feel that strongly about it...I don’t want to fight with you. Especially not tonight. I’m too tired...”

“If you say you're tired one more time, I’m gonna...”

“Don’t threaten me now,” interrupted Edelstein, and he grimaced at the pain of having to exert energy in order to halt what he believed to be Beilschmidt’s hostility. That, plus Edelstein was trying to make himself climb from the floor, and gave up; it hurt too bad.

\-- Too tired to stand, and too tired to fight. 

“Yeah, but,” Beilschmidt began, “I was just gonna say, if you keep complaining about being so tired, I’d carry you upstairs. You know...if I could.” 

“Can’t you?” Edelstein asked. 

“How would I know? I’ve never tried,” said Beilschmidt. “Small things are easy. Light things. Like matches and brooms. Now those I can handle! But heavy things, like axes and you...I’m not so sure.” 

Edelstein smiled but his eyes narrowed as if confused. “Just a moment ago you called me skinny, and now you claim I’m too heavy?” he teased.

“I don’t know if you are or not, Fussy Pants, but I imagine I’ll find out eventually.”


	14. Chapter 14

Edelstein managed to pry himself from the floor of the parlor to trudge his way upstairs. Beilschmidt lingered behind, picking up the busted glass from the broken picture frame. -- Using his bare hands, despite finding the broom now yesterday, and hell, he smirked to himself, maybe he WOULD eat the shards of glass for breakfast. The ghost amused by the former words of Edelstein, and how he possessed such odd ideas. Assuming a ghost can’t eat pancakes, but can eat broken glass? “He’s got a lot of learning to do...” Beilschmidt muttered to himself. Though truth be told, in all his eleven years of death, Beilschmidt had never once tried to eat. -- Lingering behind, and picking up the glass with his fingers. Thinking it best Edelstein went on without him, in case he wanted to bathe before bedtime. ‘I’ll give you some privacy,’ he had grinned. 

The ghost had also mentioned the layout of the upstairs quarters. ‘A big bathroom right next to my room,’ Beilschmidt had said, a few minutes prior, ‘ah, I mean our room,’ he had laughed. ‘Plus the broom room,’ Beilschmidt had told him, ‘I never used it for anything...’ and another room could have been added to the ‘empty’ list, yet Beilschmidt’s brother, West, had used it for a short time. -- In reference to it:

‘Oh, and don’t go into that first room at the top of the stairs,’ Beilschmidt had advised him. ‘Don’t ask me why, just don’t.’ 

***

Once climbing the stairs, Edelstein lifted his hand from the banister, and stepped foot upon the narrow landing. Down the hall, he saw all the lit candles, still beaming, though the wax was melted, and each candle stood only as a stub. 

“A ghost who plays with matches...” Edelstein mused, and shrugged while tugging at his coat sleeves, ready to shed the heavy garment, and make his way to the bathroom Beilschmidt had boasted of as ‘big’. 

“God, I hope it has running water,” Edelstein said, and realized how careless he was, not to have checked the plumbing last night while touring the house. ‘Who on earth doesn’t ask about the pipes?!’ he scolded himself, falling silent, for the creaking floorboards were noisy enough. Each one moaning out beneath his footfalls, and Edelstein figured it was the one attribute of the house which couldn’t be blamed on its status of ‘haunted’, but was the one attribute most people probably noticed, were frightened of, and of course blamed on the ghost. Yet it was one of only two attributes Edelstein wanted to change. 

“I’ll rip you up and install steel beams!” he hissed at the wood flooring. 

\-- The other attribute was the vertigo caused by the seemingly spinning parlor. Edelstein figured, though, some things can’t be changed.

Reaching the next-to-last shut door in the hall, Edelstein entered the so-called ‘big' bathroom, and his mouth fell agape. “Big?!” he scoffed. “Big for a mouse, maybe...” And he squeezed past the pedestal sink, finding a candle in its basin. Another candle on the back of the toilet. Yet another candle in the windowsill. “He can put a new bulb in the foyer, and one in the kitchen, and apparently make a lantern glow without fire until he feels like lighting it, but this?!” Sick of the smell of melted wax. Sick of the sight of small flames flickering about, casting shadows on the wall. What he first found romantic, at least in theory, was now starting to feel like the old days of not having any electricity in certain hiding places. As if turning on the lights would be too dangerous. Can’t be spotted. Gotta crouch in the dark and hope to God no one spots you. A bomb shelter made out of a hole in the ground, like a grave without a lid. Embed yourself deep enough, and dig a place to hide, like an underground cave just wide enough to slip your legs beneath you, and cover your head, quick! Here comes the planes. And once the gunfire ceases, dust yourself off, scurry home in the darkness, and find a board to throw against the window pane before lighting a candle, should you hope to read propaganda pamphlets, just to stay on top of things. Before drifting off to sleep...and Edelstein cringed at the reminder of holding a candle in bed instead of possessing the careless ability to click on a lamp. 

Ease and luxury. -- That’s what electricity brings.

Edelstein pondered the lack of bulbs in the house. How Beilschmidt must have had at least two floating about, and a box of matches, and what seemed to be an endless supply of candles! But ah, at least there was a tub fit for a king. 

“This must be what he meant by big,” Edelstein smiled. “It takes up most the room!” he noted of the tub, and bent over its ledge, touching his hand to the faucet marked ‘hot’. Twisting the tap, a sound like a machine gun firing at a galvanized bucket shot through the room. “Ahck!” screamed Edelstein, and he covered his ears. “CAPTAIN BEILSCHMIDT! GET UP HERE!!”

A God awful smell soon followed the clack-clack-clack of the jittery pipes. An acidic smell, or something akin to a car leaking oil on a dirt road on a hot day. “This is a nightmare,” Edelstein said, but in a nonchalant tone. Knowing damn well the memories of wartime were the nightmare, and this was a mere inconvenience. “But I did want a nice bath,” he whispered. Remembering a time when baths were few and far between. “At least wash my face...” he added, and trailed off. Tugging his coat completely from his body before tossing the garment onto a nearby towel rack, he turned and watched the door, huffing in impatience. He hollered again; a delayed addition to his prior command: “THIS INSTANT!!”

Waiting, and watching wide-eyed, Edelstein tilted his head, and studied the sight of the candles in the room. How all of a sudden they seemed to glow a furious blue. “Of all the strange things...” Edelstein said, and in a split second, the three candles extinguished themselves. 

A pitch-black room surrounded him, and Edelstein called out, “If this is you, it’s not funny!” 

He whimpered to punctuate the statement, despite trying to keep his composure; despite trying to stay angry instead of growing scared. “Captain Beilschmidt??” he asked, and a fog seeped into the bathroom. Drifting over the threshold, it oozed past the sink, climbing the pedestal and rising up, to illuminate a small mirror above the basin.

“Come and look,” came a voice. 

Edelstein lingered near the windowsill, and yet he feared keeping his back to the glass any longer. He stepped away from it, inching to the center of the narrow room -- one hand on the tub ledge for balance; the faucet still sputtering and now the water ran like gobs of mud shooting out from a slim silver cannon; thinking if he left it on a while, perhaps the clanking would cease, and the water would run odorless and clear -- he approached the mirror, but feared that sheet of glass, too! Somehow the voice didn’t strike him as familiar. Somehow Beilschmidt still seemed very far away from this ‘big’ bathroom. 

“I don’t want to,” Edelstein finally said. And feeling the need to bury the refusal, “What? Did you learn a new trick or something??” he blurted a joke, or what he hoped was a joke. A bit of teasing, trying to lighten his own mood. “Whatever it is, it can wait until you fix these pipes! Just listen to them,” he rambled, wringing his hands in front of him. “I’m tired, and I want to go to bed...” 

Remembering Beilschmidt’s earlier annoyance with Edelstein's overuse of the phrase ‘I’m tired’, he rushed to revise the statement. “I mean,” Edelstein stammered with a feeble laugh, “I’d like to take a bath now, please. If that’s all right.” The friendly route. Playing Mister Nice Guy again. Whatever he needed to do in order to get his way. “Just hop down here and help me. Besides, I hate it when you’re a mist and not a body...” 

“Who are you talking to?” Beilschmidt asked, and he peeked his head past the opened door of the bathroom. Standing in the hall, the whitish outline of the soldier, haunting in ‘full force’, same as he did in the parlor when Edelstein last saw him. 

“You,” Edelstein breathed out as if someone had struck him from behind with a wooden plank. “But then who is...??”

And for whatever reason, Edelstein rushed to the glowing mirror above the sink. He stared into a face he recognized. “It’s a memory! A bad dream!!” he cried. And in the mirror, if only for an instant, appeared the same face from the oil painting hung above the mantel downstairs. 

A screech sounded from the pipes, like metal bending before it breaks or twists into a jagged shape. “Fix this!!” Edelstein screamed, and motioned to the tub with a jerk of his body while clasping his hands to his ears. “I can’t stand this place!” 

Beilschmidt crossed the threshold into the bathroom, and glanced at the mirror before squeezing past Edelstein. “You know, he just gets lonely down there, I guess,” and he laughed but it came out weak. “I would too, if I was like that...” And Beilschmidt reached for the faucet, turning down the ‘hot’ tap, and turning on the 'cold'. “It’s funny though,” he said, and glanced up to Edelstein, “I haven’t seen or heard from that guy since I first came home that night. He must have sensed someone new was here.” 

“Are you telling me this place was already haunted?!” Edelstein snapped, and uncovered his ears. “How many ghosts should I expect??”

“I’m not sure, Fussy Pants. Just me, and him, and...that first bedroom in the hall over here, it’s kind of, um...well,” Beilschmidt struggled to explain, and shut one eye, grimacing. "It’s kinda strange. Even I don’t go in there!” 

“And that’s why you don’t like the parlor? Some silly painting?!” Edelstein scoffed. “And here I thought you couldn’t stand it because of the pictures on the wall.”

“Well I’m not too wild about those either,” Beilschmidt confessed. “Why should I be? Would you?!” 

Edelstein huffed. “I’m going downstairs right now, and I’m going to burn that painting!” 

“Do it and die, Fussy Pants. That’s my grandpa you’re talking about!”

Edelstein stared hard at the colorless image of Beilschmidt near the tub-side, and his whimpering pout formed into a grin. “Your grandpa,” Edelstein began, and a slight laugh followed, “you mean to tell me your grandfather is watching me from a bathroom mirror?!” And he burst into a fit of laughter. “Is he perverted? Or God, let me guess, in addition to your grandma, did he have a thing for men??” Edelstein carried on, his cheeks red, and he rubbed his forehead as if stricken with utter confusion yet so amused at his own line of thought, “Of all the outlandish things I’ve heard today, and learned about this house, Captain Beilschmidt, THIS takes the cake! You honestly expect me to believe a painting holds the ghost of your elder, and he just flies up here the second I plan to undress?!” 

Edelstein laughed again, despite Beilschmidt’s narrowed eyes; a murderous gaze directed right at him -- Beilschmidt fuming -- yet something subtler caught Edelstein’s attention...a slight movement...a sound. Like ice when stepped upon, and it cracks, creating a hairline fracture before branching out. 

He glanced to the mirror above the sink, and sure enough...

‘Clicks’ and ‘snaps’ and similar sounds grew in strength. What looked to be a spiderweb formed on the face of the bathroom mirror. Scrawling out to reach all four corners, like an elaborate detailed sketch drawn in graphite. 

“He’s doing that,” Beilschmidt said. “He heard you, ya jerk.” 

Right then, the splintered glass broke free and rained down into the sink basin. Most of it toppled the candle, yet several fine slivers bounced onto the floor. 

“Seven years bad luck,” Edelstein said, as if lost in a brief trance.

“Yeah, and Seven Years’ War. What of it?” Beilschmidt spat. “I swear to God, if I have to pick up one more piece of glass because of you, I’m gonna...” but he sighed in lieu of capping the threat. “You wanted to take a bath, right?” he asked. “I’m gonna make sure you take a bath...” And Beilschmidt marched from the tub, pushing past Edelstein en route to the door. Sticking his head out into the hall, Beilschmidt called, “Hey! No more of that tonight, all right? You got your own room in this house!” Turning around to face Edelstein again, Beilschmidt withdrew a match from his sleeve like a magician producing an ace during a card trick. “Old Man...that’s what we used to call him...he always had a thing for guys like you,” Beilschmidt laughed. “You got pretty lucky with that guess!” And he winked at Edelstein -- a strange sight, considering Beilschmidt’s eyes were white on white, yet the hint of lines and even the tint of warm colors were present -- as he circled the room, relighting the two candles still standing. “Used to drive my grandma crazy. My parents, too, when they were here.” 

“I never met your parents,” Edelstein recalled. “Only you and your brother...that day at the farm.” 

“You don’t want to talk about that now,” Beilschmidt said; a strange smile on his face. “You want a nice bath, right? Now that we’re alone.” 

“Well, how do you know we’re alone??” Edelstein asked. 

“I know,” said Beilschmidt. “Besides, he can’t walk around here like I can. He doesn’t have free rein of this place like I do!” he laughed. “I remember when I was still alive,” Beilschmidt reminisced, and he reached out, knocking his fist upon the faucet, “he never once bothered me,” and with his voice raised, so as to speak above the clanking of the pipes, “I only ever saw him in the painting. His eyes would follow me. He’d wink, or open his mouth...things like that,” Beilschmidt damn near screamed. “And that parlor is a wild ride, isn't it? Ha,” he said in jest, and hit the faucet a second time, this time causing it to sputter even louder, and after a moment of hesitation, the water spewed out clear and in a steady stream; void of any unnatural sound or scent. “You already found that out though, didn’t you? Nothing I could do to stop it.” 

“But where were you then?” Edelstein asked as he approached the tub. Standing near the ledge, watching Beilschmidt’s handiwork. The flickering of the two candles making the tub shine a peaceful white. The figure of Beilschmidt nearly lost in the scenery. Slick as the wet tub, his ‘skin’ seemed to glow, much akin to the mirror before it broke. Edelstein was still not entirely convinced Beilschmidt hadn’t broke it himself; played a trick; wanting to watch Edelstein bathe, and thus he pretended to be some other spook haunting this home; a man in a painting, indeed! As if the whole house -- the whole town...the whole country, perhaps -- was plagued by ghosts. 

Their minds and hearts, maybe. 

“I don’t know, Fussy Pants. I think I was here, or maybe I was up there somewhere,” Beilschmidt said while pointing to the ceiling. He soon put both hands on the taps, and twisted them as far as they would go, so as to run the bath quicker. Bending down to put a stopper in the drain, since the water was now usable, he clarified, “The sky, I mean. That seems to be the only place I can float to. There, and to my grave. I wake up there. I wake up in bed. It’s like I’m dreaming all the time, and just when I think I’m awake, poof! I wake up again. I’m asleep again.” 

“Over and over, on repeat, hmm?” Edelstein asked. “It doesn’t sound much different from life down here.” 

“Oh, you go floating up to the sky, and down to a grave, huh?” Beilschmidt mocked. “You’re a smart guy. Now why don’t you just slip off your clothes and take your nice little bath, and I’ll stand guard.”

Edelstein huffed as if offended. Making a face as if Beilschmidt couldn’t possibly be serious, but...he groaned, and unbuttoned the top button of his shirt. “If you say so,” he finally said, and nodded in agreement. “Do you really think your Old Man will come back here? Or...”

“Or I just want to hang out with you while you’re completely naked,” Beilschmidt laughed, providing a possible alternative; finishing Edelstein’s sentence. “You really are a smart guy,” he said, and paced to the doorway of the bathroom. Letting his gaze linger on the broken glass in the sink basin. A brief look of mourning overcame him, for he always liked that mirror, God damn it. -- It was the only mirror in the whole of the house West had failed to drape with a sheet. -- “I imagine there will be plenty of time for all things nudey and fun,” Beilschmidt teased. “You know...all things considering.” And he sat down on the threshold, stretching out his long legs, spreading them apart to form a wide ‘V’. Boots tipping to one side and then the other. A grin on his face as if awaiting a show to begin. 

Edelstein unbuttoned a few more buttons, then stopped to ask, “Shouldn’t you be looking into the hallway for your pesky Old Man?”

“Shouldn’t you be getting into the tub already, Young Master?” 

“I...” Edelstein wasn’t sure how to counter such a lofty sobriquet. “Master??” he repeated. “Of all the silly things you’ve called me, I like that one the least!”

Beilschmidt shrugged. “I can see into the hallway too,” he said, and the ghost leaned back, craning his neck so as to spy the candlelit corridor. “All dying down,” he noted of the flames. “I’ll go and replace them while you take off your pants.”

Edelstein shook his head, breathing out in an exaggerated tone, as if annoyed but amused. “Young Master,” he half-muttered and half-snickered to himself -- once alone in the room -- and admitted, “I wish I was still young!” He unbuttoned the last button of his shirt. “I wish you were still young," he said of Beilschmidt. “I wish...” And he stuck his hand beneath the stream of warm water. “I wish it were more than just dreaming,” he said of death. “I always thought it’d be more than that.” 

Soon Beilschmidt’s wandering of the hall met Edelstein's ears. The floorboards creaking beneath heavy boots. The sound of a match stricken against the thick fabric of a soldier’s uniform. The hissing of something unearthly, however, arose from the bathwater before Edelstein could even unbuckle his belt. 

“You might want to come and check this for your grandfather’s ghost!” he shouted, and eyed the water, which yes, looked completely uninhabited, but, “I’m not taking any chances with you Beilschmidt men!” he added.

Leaning over, Edelstein tugged his boots from his feet, and rolled down his socks, tossing them to the floor. Humming a moment, in hopes of drowning out the hissing-sound. Once barefoot, Edelstein leaned up, and peered into the tub, studying it closer now, and there he saw the vague image of a man staring back at him! Stranger than the face in the mirror...but it wasn’t completely unfamiliar. A stranger, though, in most rights, for somehow, the helpless face peering up at him from the rippling water, emitting a faint blue light...it looked to be the Italian.


	15. Chapter 15

Edelstein backed away from the tub, and tripped, falling into the far corner of the bathroom. His back against the wall; his body crumpled beneath the windowsill. The two candles casting light all around him, but the rest of the room was dark. Not even the hallway allowed much light to shine in, despite Beilschmidt’s previous act of retracing his steps and relighting the flames. Perhaps he had found the need to replace a few candles. Gone again, to visit his stash, and Edelstein was sure of it, for now he heard no more footsteps, and no more creaking boards. 

“Are you out there?! I saw something!” he screamed. “I’m seeing faces again,” and he mumbled an addition, once again questioning his sanity. “Or maybe I need glasses,” Edelstein said, almost in a tone akin to scolding himself, for how could he not know if he needed glasses? Proper men get their eyesight checked. Proper men know if they’re sane or not. Proper men ask about the plumbing, prior to purchasing a home, and least not of all, by any stretch of the imagination, do proper men seek out and buy a haunted house!

“You just had to have it, didn’t you?” Edelstein asked himself, yet he sounded so weak and far away, his voice might as well have seeped from the wall like a message from one of the various entities who had spoken to him that night. “You just had to...” 

Edelstein curled into a position as if braced for impact on a plane before it crashes. Hugging his legs; his head bowed at his knees, and he soon rubbed his hands to the nape of his neck. “I give up,” he said. “If this is a game, I don’t want to play it anymore,” and he uttered three little words he had probably failed to say at any other point in his life: “I was wrong.” 

A breathless confession, and he shuddered at the recalled image of the Italian’s face. As if someone had painted the young man in watercolors, and dunked the canvas to the bottom of the bathtub. Letting it sit there long enough for the paint to bleed and rise, yet somehow stay intact in the interim to still form the intended picture. A likeness of the friendly neighbor, sure, but, “How is it possible? This house is haunted, not one magic trick after another, and...” Edelstein’s eyes grew heavy as he rubbed his arms across them. Feeling the onset of tears, and he turned his face, his gazed lifted towards the bathtub. “You can’t be there, unless...I’m either going crazy, after all, or Beilschmidt did this, or...”

Thinking the image of the Italian did look rather like a painting, “Maybe the Old Man is tricking me!” Edelstein snapped, and his eyes went wide. “That’s it, I bet!” and he laughed as if figuring out an answer to a riddle, but what was the prize? Talking to himself in a dark bathroom while awaiting a ghost to arrive and guard him while he bathed?! “I’ve heard about these things...” Edelstein carried on, “how ghosts and demons and such can take on the form of other people, people you know and trust, and they lure you in, and trick you!” Thinking Beilschmidt’s Old Man must have adopted the visage of the friendly Italian. “I’m gonna show you!” he said. “I’ll prove it.”

And so Edelstein scooted about, climbing up only high enough to sort of inspect the tub before approaching it. Sensing it safe, he crawled over to its ledge, and peered over the brim and down into the water. -- Nothing. 

“Huh,” said Edelstein, and he took the chance to turn off the faucet. 

He glanced back to the bathwater, and again failed to see a face. “I’m sure I saw it beforehand,” he tried to convince himself. “I know I did...” 

“Boo!” shouted Beilschmidt, and Edelstein fell backwards. 

“Damn it!!” he yelled, upon finding himself returned to the same far corner; sitting in the shadows with his head against the wall. Flat on his ass, and he jutted out one leg as if he could somehow kick the ghost levitating near the threshold. 

“Talking to inanimate objects again,” Beilschmidt teased, and ‘ _tsk-tsk_ '-ed at his new friend. “I tell ya, Fussy Pants...I leave you alone for five seconds, and I come back to find you talking to the tub and jumping out of your skin!” 

“Well what do you expect?!” Edelstein screamed, and he wiped the hair from his eyes, to say nothing of the tears from his cheeks, before pointing to the tub with a wild gesture of his right hand. “I saw a face in there, you idiot!” 

“Oh, so now I’m an idiot, is that it?!” Beilschmidt seethed. “You know, I do have a brain, even if it IS buried in a grave,” he attempted to joke, but shook it off, cringing at his own morbidness. “Never mind. I’ve still got my senses. Don’t need a body for a soul, or a brain for thought, right? Ha ha. I’ve got it all figured out, Fussy Pants! It’s like an abandoned house, see? And when no one lives in the house, the lights go out, just like when you die, and...” 

“Would you stop it with your incessant rambling about life and death, and come help me?!” Edelstein pleaded. His voice breaking somewhere near the end of the line. Tears falling steadily, and he scrambled to stand; struggling to rise upright, to face the ghost who loomed in the doorway. “Help me!” he repeated, and hell, this time he cried it. “I’m asking you, whatever you are to me...please!” 

Beilschmidt cocked his head, and narrowed his eyes as if half-expecting Edelstein to be in the midst of playing his own trick. ‘What’s the catch?’ he might as well have asked. Staring hard at the man near the window. Edelstein’s shirt hung open, and a thin undershirt beneath it showed: both shirts white. Matching the ghost. And somewhere at Edelstein's neck, or in the vicinity of a rather delicate collarbone, a silver cross shone. It glinted the nearby candlelight, thus causing a distraction. “If you’re Jewish, why do you wear a cross like that?” Beilschmidt asked. “I mean...Edelstein??” he emphasized the surname, and laughed as if he had grown further suspicious. “I don’t get it,” he said, but stepped towards Edelstein -- sort of stepped; a mix of floating, and touching his boots to the floor ever so often -- past the pedestal sink and broken glass; drifting through the narrow bathroom, and he reached the far side of it like a fog-lamp pointed out across a small dark sea. Taking its sweet time in bathing a lost ship with its light. Its presence. “You’re waiting for me to save you, but I’ve got a feeling you’re already saved.” Beilschmidt plucked the cross from Edelstein’s chest, and held it between his forefinger and thumb. “Isn’t that right? There’s nothing wrong here,” and he let go the cross. “The bath is drawn...the tub is filled. Get in there before I throw you in!”

“I can’t,” Edelstein pleaded. Sniffling, he reached for the cross himself. Rubbing it between his own fingers. “I saw something in the tub,” he added, peering down at the religious symbol affixed to a chain. “I saw a face in that tub, and I’m not going in there. Not even if you pay me!” 

Beilschmidt laughed, and once glancing to the tub and back, he again reached for the cross. “Well I’m not paying you,” he teased, and touched Edelstein’s fingers: both men with their hands upon the cross. “What is this thing, really?”

“I wanted people to think differently of me,” Edelstein admitted. “I never stopped wearing it. Got used to the feel.” 

“A weight around your neck,” Beilschmidt said, and he tugged at the cross, thus choking Edelstein with the chain. 

Both men groaned in pain. Edelstein at the mild strangulation, and Beilschmidt at the heat upon his hands.

“Damn it to hell!” the latter said, and withdrew his grasp, shaking his hand, even blowing at it, as if he had just put out a flame with his bare fingers. “Kiss it!” he said like a kid with a boo-boo. “Quick!” he begged. 

Edelstein recoiled a moment, taken aback by the request, but as Beilschmidt continued prompting with persistent nodding and whining, and his lips puckered as if sulking, Edelstein finally grabbed a hold of Beilschmidt’s wrist, pulling the ghost’s hand to his mouth, and he kissed his fingertips. -- Or tried to. 

Like kissing thin air. Yet...his mouth seemed to stop somewhere. Landing against a surface undoubtedly akin to a couple inches of skin. Even a sound of a kiss was heard in the far corner of the ‘big’ bathroom. 

“I could get used to this,” Beilschmidt smirked.

Edelstein freed his grasp in an instant. “Never mind all that. What I want you to do is this,” and he backed away from Beilschmidt in a maneuver akin to a basketball player stealing a ball on his way to the hoop. Inching around the ghost, almost bumping into the candle on the windowsill. “I want you to look in there,” he said, motioning to the bathtub with a wave of his hand. “Go on. Tell me if you see a face.” 

“In the water?” Beilschmidt asked deadpan. “Now I’ve heard of faces in mirrors before,” he explained, as if it were the most logical occurrence in the history of the world, “and I know all about paintings with eyes that move, but...you really think there’s people in your bathwater??”

“YES!” said Edelstein, and he grumbled. “Now go on and check!!” 

Beilschmidt kissed his own fingers, singed by the cool metal of the cross, and he hovered towards the tub. Peering over the ledge, he tilted his head and reported, “I see water, Doctor Obvious, what did you think I’d see.” 

Edelstein sighed, and shut his eyes. “I don’t know,” he conceded. “I guess it’s long gone now.” 

“The face?” Beilschmidt asked. “Well...whose face was it? I mean...” he began to sound a bit more sympathetic, as if struck with a hint of guilt for not believing his new friend. “Was it a woman? - A man?? - Maybe a soldier like me?” 

“It was your neighbor,” Edelstein blurted, and he opened his eyes, staring at the water, thinking maybe the face would reappear due to being named. “That Italian fellow...I’m sure of it.”

“Uh-huh,” Beilschmidt nodded, still unconvinced, yet he bent down, and stuck his fingers into the tub. “No one’s here, Fussy Pants,” he said, sloshing the water as if checking its temperature. “You think maybe you just can’t get that guy out of your head or something? Maybe you thought he was cute...I know I do,” he grinned. “But what can you do, right? Now my brother!” he boasted while standing straight again, “West REALLY thought he was cute.” 

“Don’t be silly,” Edelstein huffed. “It’s nothing of the sort.”

“Hmm,” Beilschmidt mused, “well, maybe we should take this seriously...”

“I’m already taking it seriously!” Edelstein shouted, and swung out, hitting Beilschmidt on the shoulder, not quite hitting, however; it was more akin to disrupting an image comprised of white smoke. The sight of the ghost’s upper arm blurred for a moment, though Beilschmidt did reach for the spot Edelstein slapped, and he even emitted a note of discomfort. 

“Ah," he said, "you don’t have to get so pissy with me!” And Beilschmidt rubbed at his arm until his shoulder was clear in view again. “I just meant, maybe it was a sign or something,” he revised. “I think you should call that poor guy, and make sure he’s all right.” 

Edelstein nodded in agreement, and stared at Beilschmidt as if the two were devising a plan via telepathy. “I think you realize I have no phone with me, and...even if I did,” he stammered, “I...don’t know his number. I doubt the phone line has been activated. God knows I haven’t done it. Haven’t had the chance! Hell, I don’t even know his real name!!” he confessed. “But what if something bad HAS happened to him?” he whined, taking one step towards the ghost. “What if it WAS a sign? What if...” 

“Just go over there, and check,” Beilschmidt said. “I can’t go with you, though," and he shrugged. “I can’t leave this house for that house.”

“You'd need to have your body dug up and reburied there, so you could visit it like a grave,” Edelstein rambled, as if engaged in some morbid train of thought; the beginning of yet another plan? “I can’t imagine anyone would want your bones beneath their property.”

“You’re starting to talk like me,” Beilschmidt noted, and he grabbed a hold of Edelstein unbuttoned shirt, and tugged at its lower hem. “Go on,” he said. “I’ll come with you to the front door, at least."

***

Edelstein slipped past Beilschmidt in the narrow ‘big’ bathroom, and he made his way into the hall. The ghost following close behind. Through a row of glowing candles, yes, several of which were newly lit and also replaced. Tall candles with small flickering flames, and the two men walked or breezed past them, respectively.

Onward towards the stairwell, and down the steps, Edelstein and Beilschmidt reached the foyer. Letting go the railing, Edelstein’s teeth chattered, for the downstairs of the house felt ten degrees cooler than when he last set foot in it.

“I’m not sure I want to know,” Edelstein said offhand.

At the front entrance, he clicked the lock, and pulled open the door. The porch dark, and rain drizzling down beyond it. “I’m going to get soaked,” he said, and turned back to check for Beilschmidt’s presence. 

The ghost stood with his back leaned against the door of the slender closet. He crossed his arms at his chest, and his chin dipped down as if studying Edelstein’s plight. As if trying to decipher just what on earth Edelstein was worried about most: his upcoming trek through a wet night, or whether or not the Italian was indeed all right. “I promise you,” he said, “you’ll dry.” Deciding Edelstein was thinking of himself for the most part. “But you know...if there is something wrong, you’ll sleep better tonight knowing...right? Right,” Beilschmidt answered himself, and smiled a soft smile. “I’m not leaving this spot ‘til you get back.” His tone sincere; a sad-eyed stare. “I’ll wait for you...I want to know you’re both safe.” 

Edelstein returned the soft smile, and let the door remain ajar. “I’ll only be a moment, I hope.” And he stepped onto the porch. Taking a deep breath before plummeting down the front steps. A deeper breath before the rain hit his skin. Struggling to button up the opened shirt, and he failed, unable to see, and he ran: holding his shirt closed with one hand, and with the other, he shielded his eyes. “I must be mad,” he said to himself, and sprinted through the mud barefoot. The squish of dirt beneath his feet; mud embedded between his toes, and he cringed. “God, it’s like a bomb scare in spring.” A dreary reminder on a dreary night, and one lawn crossed, and Edelstein placed both hands atop a wooden fence. Working his way over it, nearly stabbed in the crotch by a sharp tip of a picket, mumbling the roughest word of profanity in his lexicon, yet simultaneously he thanked God for not letting his nether regions get impaled by a fence-post. “So close,” he mumbled in the dark, and caught his balance in the Italian’s yard. Rushing to the red door of the friendly neighbor’s house. Running both hands through his drenched hair, Edelstein narrowed his eyes, and noticed no lights emitting from the windows. No sound from the street. No man or woman or child awake at this hour, for Twelve AM was long passed in the parlor. One AM died away in the ‘big’ bathroom. Two AM now, and the world was asleep. The ghost was waiting. Only the Italian needed accounted for, and if a dismal trek through a storm and mud was necessary to put Edelstein’s mind at ease, once seeing an abstract rendering of a face in a bathtub, then fine, it was high time and worth it to put a rest to such things. 


	16. Chapter 16

Edelstein approached the red door of the Italian’s house, and grabbed the knob, shaking it, half-expecting it to be unlocked. Failing to knock first, for he felt pounding on a door in the middle of the night would be obscene. As if coming to call past a designated time would lead the Italian to deeming Edelstein a 'bad' neighbor. Ah, but letting yourself in, and creeping through the dark to check on someone would be fine? Edelstein wasn’t sure, and his logic seemed backwards. His mind made up, however, as he fiddled with the knob, twisting it hard one way and then the other. Breathing out in abbreviated whines for he shivered on the doorstep. The green welcome mat beneath his bare feet felt like fake grass, and it had a plastic daisy affixed to one corner. Bowing his head to read the single word, he realized the most plausible place one might hide a key. “I bet...” he began, and knelt down to roll up the daisy-adorned corner of the mat. “Ah ha!” he said, and sure enough, “A key.” He held it up like a kid who had just found a golden Easter egg. “I’ve got it now,” he announced, and slid the key into the lock. 

Whispering the word, “Quiet,” as if to instruct himself; pace himself. Edelstein lightened his hold upon the key and knob, and turned both, ever so slightly, until the door eased open from its frame. “I’m in,” he said to the idea of Beilschmidt. 

Setting foot into the Italian’s house proved to be a harder task than finding entrance. Edelstein lingered on the mat, scared to step his muddy feet on what looked to be white carpet. ‘Surely not,’ he thought, and distrusted his vision due to the lack of light. -- Only a slight bit shone from a room down a hall, and the faintest hint of orange drifted in from the streetlamp far behind him. 

“I don’t care,” he decided, yet he did his best to wipe his feet on the fake grass of the mat. The rough blades freed some of the mud from his toes, and he finally inched into the Italian’s home. Holding tight to the door a moment, he realized how crazy he’d look, should the Italian prove to be alive and awake. ‘Maybe he’s sleeping, and won’t see me,’ Edelstein resolved, but then fretted: ‘I hope he doesn’t own a gun!’

Similar wishes soon flooded his mind while tiptoeing down the carpeted hallway. Forced to step over wayward objects and piles of clothes cluttering the floor, Edelstein neared the one room from whence a light shone. He placed both hands on the wall near a door opened an inch or so, and he tried to peek through the slit. 

Unable to see any thing more than a far corner of what looked to be a sitting room, Edelstein turned and searched the hall for a room more likely to house a bed, and therefore -- he hoped -- the Italian himself. 

One such door appeared promising. A shut door opposite a table in the hall. Atop the table was a black rotary phone and a vase of blue flowers. Upon the door’s face, dead in its center, hung a plaque which read some phrase in Italian. A small canvas affixed to a green ribbon, and Edelstein tried to decipher the text, but came up empty. Thinking at first it said a name, but it looked rather strange to him. ‘Personal, though,’ he thought, and figured it as good a guess as any, in regards to finding the Italian in bed. 

Edelstein touched the knob, and with his nose near the plaque, tried one final time to read the phrase as he turned the knob, and pushed open the door. In what little light was allowed to him, Edelstein spotted a bed, yet it looked to be empty. “Hmm,” he said, and felt around until he found a switch near the entrance. Clicking it, the overhead light beamed a soft yellow, illuminating the Italian’s bedroom. “No one here,” Edelstein realized, and he peered into the hall one last time -- ducking out, as if making sure he hadn't been followed or noticed -- and then he paced towards the bed. His heart jumped into his chest, in that sickly hollow way akin to avoiding a car accident; when you miss another vehicle by a damn inch, and you breathe out, pained, hands clasped tight to the steering wheel, knowing how close it was, and how you could be dead, _but for the grace of God_ , and on and on, his heart raced and his mind struggled to comprehend another set of text. For on the bed, atop its strewn covers and wrinkled sheets, lied a handwritten note. Pale red stationary. Almost pink. The ink a deep blue.

‘ _I’m going to the lake, and I’ll finally be with you_ ,’ the note read. The rest of the lines penned in what Edelstein could only assume was Italian. He lifted the note from the bed, and, for whatever reason, he sniffed the page. 

A strange action, perhaps, but soon Edelstein buried the note to his chest. More understandable. As if replacing the cravat. A page from the hand of the Italian at Edelstein’s heart, and near the Italian’s heart was a cut of fabric from Edelstein’s neck. The scent of each other...the idea of each other...two men without a living friend in the world except the potential to befriend one another, and...of course, a shared mourning for two brothers known as Beilschmidt. 

“The lake!” Edelstein cried; a delayed reaction; a much-needed pause to process the intelligible line and to catch a glimpse of the Italian in his mind -- scent the closest sense tied to memory -- and it gave Edelstein a feeling of not being alone. Not facing the bleak prospect alone. The intentional death of a young man heartbroken? “I’ll stop him,” Edelstein swore, and raced back through the house with the note in hand. 

Passing the front door, Edelstein pulled it shut, and made a beeline for his yellow car. Footsteps pounding on a walkway cracked and whittled away by time. The edges crumbling, and grass growing through the slabs of concrete reminiscent of tipped-over headstones.

Edelstein reached a front gate to the picket fence, and unlatched the exit. Jogging to his vehicle, while panting, out of breath. Rain blinding him, as he unlocked and threw open the driver’s side door, and slid in behind the wheel. “God, where was it? How far?!” _A half-mile away_ , he suddenly recalled the real estate agent had said of the lake. “But in what direction??” Edelstein pondered aloud, just begging the storm clouds. Adjusting the rear-view mirror, and drawing the seat-belt tight around his body, he tossed the Italian’s letter into the passenger seat. Flicking on the headlights. Starting the engine. Windshield wipers manic as he drove away from the curb. 

“Captain Beilschmidt!” he called, and, “God damn it!!” he cursed. 

Having forgotten the ghost was waiting at home for Edelstein’s ‘safe’ return. For him to come bearing ‘good’ news. For him to step foot into their well-lit house again, and say to him, ‘The Italian is...’ status unknown, but the vision Edelstein had suffered -- the face in the tub; peering at him lifeless from the bathwater -- led him to believe the conclusion-left-blank was most likely ‘dead' or 'drowning’. 

His barefoot heavy on the gas pedal, Edelstein barreled off into the night. A dark lonely road until he spotted a sign, not far from his and Beilschmidt’s house. _Dead End_ , it read, and so, “This must be it,” Edelstein decided. 

A sharp curve near a wide tree, and soon the road narrowed and slithered along like a flattened gray snake comprised of gravel. The crunch beneath the tires sounded even above the engine’s noise and the rain as it pounded. “The lake, the lake,” Edelstein seemed to chant, looking out both windows and in front of him and behind, just in case he missed it; trying to keep an eye out, and prepare himself for what sight he was sure to find on the bleak horizon. 

“Of all the stupid things,” he said, glancing over to the note on the passenger seat. Half-imagining the Italian sitting next to him, holding the letter and Edelstein’s cravat. What he would say to him...surely something kinder than dismissing the Italian’s decision as dumb. Knowing men reach the end of their rope all too often, and what the Italian really needed was help and hope. “I’m sorry,” Edelstein said to the idea of the Italian. “I didn’t forget,” he promised, this time directed to the idea of Beilschmidt. And, “I can’t see!” he cried, only to himself.

The headlights useless as the car careened into black. A roaring splash. Harsh glugs emitted in the darkness, as the heavy object nosedived; sinking. Waves rising and churning, followed by a horrible hiss as the icy water doused the warm metal of the engine. The yellow car forced into silence; submerged in the lake, and a half-mile away, a ghost’s eyes widened, and he fell to his knees. 

“You didn’t play it right,” Beilschmidt muttered out, as if the rules of a game had been disobeyed. Grabbing his chest -- tears falling -- “You weren’t supposed to go yet,” he argued with the idea of Edelstein. “Not without telling me...” 


	17. Chapter 17

On the shore of the lake, the Italian stood in momentary shock. Watching the water swallow a vehicle whole. The taillights the final sight the Italian saw, yet they died before sinking below the threshold. The lake breached by what sounded damn near like a madman driving fast enough to elude police. “What a crazy thing to do!” the Italian deemed, and he scurried towards the water's edge.

A flashlight in one hand, and an umbrella in the other: the Italian had come prepared. For once in his life, he had the foresight to realize, ‘This might not be it...better arm myself, just in case.’ Having made a couple of trips to the lake in the past several years, to quell his temptation to end his life. Sometimes, stepping right upon the brink was enough to appease him. Gazing out upon a lake, usually at sunset, filled him with romantic notions of passing away. A lovely end and an easy way; longing to be released; homesick for a place he had never ventured to. And to be reunited with his family and a certain man he believed was in Heaven.

Still, he always changed his mind at the last minute. Thank God! No shame in staring down into a lake, and counting the cards still in your hand. Knowing damn well the deck holds four aces, and eventually, you’ll draw one. Just wait.

Hope and help: that’s what he needed. All he needed. Love in the past tense, but what fine memories. Enough to keep him warm while standing in the rain. _Better to have loved and lost_ , and other such thoughts brought him peace, but kept him awake at night, or stirred him from slumber usually in the darkest hours, causing him to rise and pace his home much akin to a certain familiar ghost. Ah, and on this night, the Italian had woken up crying, and couldn’t stand the silence any longer. Having penned out a farewell note, should anyone find it, he had then driven his own little car to the lake -- it was parked nearby, safe on high ground; a hill of sand roped off, and with a walkway of steps leading to a wooden dock -- and climbed out, only to trudge up and down the shoreline. Watching a sight much less romantic than a sunset. A dreary storm. Rain on water, and it was all the same. The lake welcoming of its own kind, and even of foreign objects, such as wayward yellow cars. 

“Didn’t he see the sign??” the Italian wondered aloud, and tears formed in his eyes. “Everyone knows the road ends!” 

Indeed, all the locals knew, once the narrow road reaches the lake, you have to swerve to the right to reach the high ground -- the designated space for parking near the dock -- and if you don’t, Oops! Cars can’t float. Doors can’t open. At least not until the pressure is equalized. The sinking car must fill with water, but then it's filled with water! Best to hold your breath, and hope for the best; or wait for help. Oh, but in the dead of night...with only one man on the shoreline. One witness. 

The Italian shined the light out onto the water. “I don’t know who you are, you poor soul, but I hope you can swim or grow fins and gills!”

A silly thought, perhaps even a callous one, but the Italian had a bottle of wine to blame. Stashed in his passenger seat, for he had felt the need for liquid courage. Something to keep him company -- other than a borrowed cravat -- on his own drive to the lake. 

Edelstein sober, and yet he couldn’t find the damn thing without plunging into it! 

Sinking cars, and stuck doors; the only route of escape remained in one solid truth: glass can be broken. 

Surely Edelstein had scrounged around, in a state of panic, to search the glove box, the floorboards, the backseat...anywhere inside the interior of his vehicle, in order to find a tool or an object worthy of busting out a window pane. 

Perhaps his last words before inhaling too much lake water had been, ‘Throw me a rock, God! I’m sinking...’ Or maybe he had begged the man in the painting to appear and crack the glass like the mirror in the bathroom. Magic! Or in the most desperate and lovesick scenario, Edelstein most likely pleaded with the idea of Beilschmidt to fly over the house, and up into the storm, plummeting down through the clouds, and into the lake, unlatching the door or shattering the window with his forehead. What else was it good for? And then the ghost could catch the floating shards with his bare hands and save them for his breakfast. -- He’d need them. No pancakes to be made. The cook unconscious, pressed against the back-dash. His hand balled into a fist, as if he had tried to break the glass himself. With his own might. His lack of strength. Easily fatigued on a clear day, breathing oxygen. Forget lungs filled with water on a stormy night, his body encased in a metal grave. Oh, but the fleeting daydream...the vision Edelstein entertained as he clung to life unknowing God’s plan: the image of Beilschmidt pulling him from the car, and up to the surface. Dragging him onto the shore. Into the sand. Past the feet of the crying Italian. Giving him room to sprawl about, and into Edelstein’s mouth, Beilschmidt could breathe. Lips pressed to lips, and bluish skin turning pink. A cough. A gag. Surely he’d spit up the lake water, and scream out in pain. ‘I almost died to save a drowning man!’ Edelstein would surely complain. Ah, but...silence remained. 

All except for the rain, and a few echos of thunder. The Italian letting the light hover over the lake. He kept thinking, for whatever odd or impish reason, the car would eventually drive out, and reappear on the other side.

Perhaps the driver, once safe on dry land, would even lean out the window and wave to him. 

The inebriated Italian giggled at the prospect. “Arrivederci!” he gleamed. 

But the brief fantasy didn’t stop his tears, and it didn’t calm his heartbeat. Toying with the notion, “Perhaps I should dive in...” 

Though ‘toying’ was putting it too lightly. More akin to a gnawing at the soul. The natural desire to want to dive in, and save his fellow man. But to risk his own life? The same life he had decided to end, but only at his own hands. Plagued by fear now, of jumping into the lake, never to resurface. Suffering the same potential fate as the driver, yet...drowning was exactly what had brought the Italian to the lake in the first place! Ah, but a changed mind. And a soul so deluded by wine, the gnawing gave way to a notion almost toyed with, as if the Italian was merely trying to decide what type of pasta he should dine on for lunch tomorrow. 

“I don’t know what to do!!” he whined.

*** 

Meanwhile, a house grew warm in the absence of a ghost. A fire dying down in the parlor. All the lights turned low. What few there were; only two fixtures fitted with bulbs, and all the candles blown out. An attic space touched upon by a pair of combat boots, until...

Out through the roof, spiraling upwards like steam let-loose from a lid lifted off a boiling pot on the stove, Beilschmidt flew.

Up and onward, to a black array of clouds, echoing thunder, and it shook Beilschmidt as he shot forward, akin to Peter Pan, if the boy who thought dying would be _an awfully big adventure_ had joined the circus, was painted white, and then fired from a cannon. 

All his might -- every ounce of existing energy -- Beilschmidt used it to propel himself forward instead of up and over to his grave. Knowing the lake was on the way; knowing if he could just stick to his current maneuver -- an action reminiscent in sight to swimming against a current -- he could somehow stall above the lake, and then let himself deflate. Become the ball of light. Fall to the earth, he hoped, and then maybe...

Just maybe...

Edelstein could be saved.


	18. Chapter 18

A questionable fate...

Edelstein against the glass; in the backseat. On folded knees, as if praying.

A final pocket of air lingering somewhere near the ceiling of the sinking vehicle.

Or hell, maybe it had long been sunk. 

To the floor of the lake, man-made, dug by angry men hellbent on making something better out of seven lazy creeks.

Those creeks never went anywhere, anyway, yet the lake was static and no better. Just lie in the sun all day, and at night, much the same. The moon looked lovely reflected, sure, and the sunset and sunrise atop the water gave certain people the illusion of romance. As if they were standing on a beach somewhere far away. Filling people's heads with foolish thoughts. The fishermen faring better, with filled stomachs thanks to the fish they caught. Not much the Italian could do with his umbrella or flashlight; what he needed was a stone to break a window, plus a fishing rod. One big enough to bait and hook a man, and reel him out from within the yellow car.

But the Italian wasn't much for fishing, nor was he hungry. His stomach filled with wine. A liquid last supper -- or so he had planned. And if Jesus himself floated down, maybe they could save Edelstein and share the wine; have a toast, and he could catch the fish for the Italian. Knowing him, he'd probably use his bare hands; walk on water to the center of the lake as if wasn't raining at all. Magic trick after magic trick, and then perhaps the two could find a loaf of bread and feed the whole town! Just a little fish, a little bread: for countless hungry mouths. The store shelves empty ahead of the new year, and now...New Year's Day was dead, and all that was left was a bitter year ahead. No more holidays for a while. No more breaks. No lazy days to lie aside the shore of the lake, where the Italian could daydream in peace and fill blank canvases, painting portraits of a soldier, who unlike Captain Beilschmidt, came home from the war alive and intact, but not for long. Many canvases already depicting the likeness of Captain Beilschmidt's brother, West, hung about the Italian's home. However, he had never thought to carry one over to the captain's house, in order to show the ghost; to show him the artistic interpretation of a handsome man in uniform. The Italian's lover and Beilschmidt's brother: a victim, not of the war, but of a sickness which ravaged him soon after it was over. Even the captain hadn't known his brother was ill. No one knew, not even the Italian. And yet, in the duration of his illness, the Italian could have guessed, but...he didn't. He didn't want to risk it. A jinx to say aloud, 'Wow, you're really not looking so well...' or to ask, 'Do you want to lie down?' or to beam, 'I know! You could take a siesta with me!!' Ah, but the Italian didn't offer, and West didn't tell. The captain's little brother a private person, never wanting others to worry, and he put all his faith in good health and proper training; whatever it took to keep his body going: that's where he put his best efforts. Eating the right things, and exercising, and getting plenty of sleep, yet only at night. No silly nap-times. No weaknesses. No complaints.

And so the Italian's beloved passed away, and Captain Beilschmidt didn't learn of it until he overhead the real estate agent discussing it with a man who came to tour the home around eight years ago. 'But didn't this house go to the owner's brother?' the prospective buyer had asked. 'Didn't he inherit it??' And the real estate agent had told him yes, he did, but now the brother was dead, too. Died in hospital. In an otherwise empty room. The Italian miles away petting a cat or taking a nap or who knows how he spent that afternoon. But news reached him soon, and he spent the rest of that year indoors. West was gone; the last of the Beilschmidts. So hence the house on the market. The house unowned. No other surviving family, and no will to dictate to whom the house should go. Why on earth West didn't will the house to someone -- anyone! -- while he was sick, is of minor importance, for if the house had passed down to another owner, then...poor Edelstein could never have bought it less than twenty-four hours ago. And surely West would be happy to know the home containing the soul of his brother -- to say nothing of their grandfather -- was now owned by a man he once called his best friend.

A picture of them; a large framed painting depicting the likeness of two little boys -- one blond, and one brunette; the latter with a funny, almost question-mark-shaped cowlick -- their backs turned to the camera of the artist's mind; a couple of kids standing on a hillside, on a green field at playtime before the war turned that field into something else entirely. A canvas filled and signed by Mrs. Edelstein...the mother of the man now pressed against the glass. She had watched them play from a distance, and painted that darn thing for hours on end once she and her son returned home to Vienna. Safe at home after a visit with family-friends in Berlin: the first and only time -- in life -- the eldest offspring of the Beilschmidts met the lone child of the Edelsteins. How that painting from 1936 survived the war was anyone's guess, but Edelstein had found it in his makeshift home and packed it, thus bringing along with him the image and memory from his childhood for the move to the haunted house.

And yet it remained unpacked; still stashed in the trunk of Edelstein's car, and so the nearby painting was now seeped in lake water. Bobbing between a box and the lid of the locked trunk, and the canvas did its best to withstand the contained flood, but the contents of the box beneath it were most definitely ruined. Old photographs wet, and scrapbooks so waterlogged, the black ink bled. Newspaper clippings, chronicling Edelstein's one and only tour across Europe, playing violin on stage in front of many, all reported on thin paper, once crisp and crinkly, were now soggy to the point of deterioration. Should anyone ever find the pages, and try to read them, the proof of performances worthy of press coverage would surely crumble or melt away like snow warmed by a child's hands.

In the midst of all this, Edelstein dreamt he was climbing a mountain again. The top of a high summit in the Alps. He dreamt he was swallowing air. So much air, his head started to spin. Clean, dry air. Enough to send him dizzy, and his chest ached to be so full of nothing but oxygen. Nothing but the substance _meant_ to be there.

Supposing the opposite were true: lungs filled with water by now, and if only Edelstein could raise his head to the pocket near the ceiling; the last inch of air allowed to him. If only he could raise his fist again, and beat on the glass of the back-dash hard enough to break through. 

If only the Italian could build up the courage to race from the edge of the lake, and dive out into the water. An excellent swimmer -- a former navy man -- and yes, he too had served his country. A little young, perhaps, but they took him regardless; whatever they could get back then. His own brother, long lost to him, was a fellow former soldier who chose instead to settle down somewhere other than his homeland; just like the Italian, he was living in the homeland of his lover, except his lover wasn't late. Living in Spain with no interest in keeping in touch with his little brother. The Italian finding solace instead by visiting Beilschmidt's house on occasion, to talk with the ghost: the big brother of the man the Italian had once hoped to spend the rest of his life with, if only in secret.

Now all of it rendered 'just a memory' the Italian only shared with the elder Beilschmidt; the captain who never knew of the love affair -- but suspected it -- while he was alive, for he didn't see much of his brother at all during the war, and was surprised to hear the stories the Italian later told him. Stories and love notes read aloud while the Italian whimpered on Beilschmidt's front porch. Waiting for the real estate agent to finish a tour, so the Italian could venture inside, 'Just for fun,' he had called it.

'But it's haunted!' the real estate agent had often warned him, ah, but the Italian played dumb, and gave him false hope; he'd promise to bring a priest to bless the home -- to exorcise it -- if only the agent would let him come inside and play awhile, to see for himself if it was truly haunted or not. All the while, knowing damn well it was! Ah, but the agent had always hoped the Italian would stick to his word, yet again, the Italian would lie, and swear nothing was wrong. He didn't want to ask for the home to be blessed; didn't want to waste a priest's time. Why bother God over such trivial things as a few odd noises in an upstairs hallway? Sure, the laughter of a man and a few flickering lights were most definitely out of the ordinary, but...maybe it was the wind. Maybe it was the wires. Maybe the agent was crazy, as the Italian had suggested a few times, but always in a pleasant tone, with a charming wink and smile; complete with rare wide eyes so the agent found himself entranced until he could do nothing but grumble about ‘no more deals’ and, 'Next time, don't even ask!' but...every single time the tours were given in the daytime, the Italian WOULD ask, or damn near beg. Even cry. 'Pretty please let me inside!!'

Only when the Beilschmidt house was toured at night, did the Italian not come and try to gain entry while the door was unlocked. 

And only one prospective buyer was ever desperate enough to tour that house on the verge of dark. In rain. Dying to see it. And here the agent assumed it would be the last tour ever given. Or...at least the last tour for decades. The average lifetime of a man: the house should have stayed with him for that long. As long as Edelstein lived, he'd be the rightful owner, and no one could deny it, for the house was paid in full, and signed over to him, but should he never regain consciousness, then to whom would the house go? No will. No heir. No living family. Not even friends. 

Back to the real estate market with a home containing a ghost. 

'Hard enough to sell it the first time!' the real estate agent would surely bemoan. 'And I had finally found a man who knew it was haunted, and STILL wanted it!!' he'd most likely cry to his mom. 'How will I ever find another owner??' And perhaps it would be suggested to just have the Beilschmidt house demolished. 

Even if it soon contained a new ghost. The spirit of a man who could very well die not far from the door of Captain Beilschmidt's abode. A man whom the real estate agent adored. A man famous for playing an instrument now stashed in an upstairs bedroom. Maybe the violin would work as a magnet to bring the spirit home. -- Should Edelstein perish. 

A statement, not a question, though perhaps it was the latter in God's mind only. Up in Heaven, for who else was in charge of Edelstein's survival? Assuming he'd go there once his cards were folded. 

***

An ace up the sleeve of an unseen man. Two men, perhaps. God doing whatever he does best when he knows someone is perishing, and Beilschmidt attempting a final act of desperation more akin to a combat mission. Forgoing the adage 'whatever happens, happens' or divine intervention, Beilschmidt wanted to lunge to the ground with such force, he'd be a bomb and blow all the water out of the lake. Clean house. Take out the whole fishy platoon! Without a lake to hold them, they'd flop all over the shoreline, and the Italian could coo some silly song to them 'til they all fell silent, as they should. He could even carry armloads of trout to town the next morning, and stock the lady's store with its empty shelves. Feed the hungry children. Share his wine. Have Edelstein take the flour from his fridge, and bake bread, and they could break it, and stuff crumbs into starving mouths. From the storm clouds, such a fantasy seemed plausible, or at least kept him company, as Beilschmidt coiled himself into the size and shape of a shiny ping-pong ball. All sight was lost to him in that moment, yet he willed himself to fly down, pressing his energy into a rolling motion towards the ground like attempting to do a somersault off the edge of a skyscraper. 

He plummeted, all right; the orb of light mistaken for a shooting star by the Italian, and, "Ah, I'll make a wish!!" the Italian beamed, pointing to the camouflaged Captain Beilschmidt, otherwise known as the orb of light gaining speed, despite the deep moans of a howling wind, or the unintelligible voice of someone, somewhere, complaining. 

Not headed for his grave, and not in his home:

Beilschmidt knew the risk from the get-go.


	19. Chapter 19

The Italian stared at the sky, wondering if the wish he made upon the assumed shooting star had put too much weight upon it, and he stood worrying the star would crash into the lake, just like Edelstein’s yellow car. Somehow, an explosion seemed imminent. The orb of light traveling with such swiftness, a brilliant white streak now trailed behind it, like a comet aimed for the shoreline. Beilschmidt barreling to the rippling surface of the lake. The singular voice moaned again, in a rattle so deafening, it shook the ground on which the Italian stood, and soon he crouched. Head bowed. “Dear God,” the Italian prayed, “please let that fallen star knock that poor car back onto dry land!”

Mistaken identity. Beilschmidt a star fallen from the heavens? No, and not a comet, either. Just a ball of light so furious with himself for not having the foresight to keep Edelstein at home that night. Safe in his own bed. The Italian could have taken care of himself, and if he was so entranced by the thought of death, then HE could have gone to a watery grave! Not Edelstein; he didn’t want to die.

And so why on earth Beilschmidt had supported the idea of his new friend going out into a storm to check on the neighbor...it sickened Beilschmidt now to think about, and something akin to a scream rose out of him: like a train when it throws on its brakes, and out comes a piercing cry. -- As the orb of light hit the surface of the water, the scream only intensified.

The Italian grimaced at the sound, and the deafening howl of what he assumed was the wind shook the ground again. 

He dropped the flashlight and covered at least one ear. To relieve the other, he shrugged his left shoulder to try and block the sound. Balancing the umbrella while crying, and saying silent prayers. 

The crash into the lake sent a rolling wave onto the shore. The Italian scrambled to stand. Grabbing his flashlight, he fumbled with it, due to sensing a separate commotion: this time on the edge of the small forest surrounding him. Soon he managed to shine the light out onto the woods, and there, amongst the trees, he spotted a trio of hooded figures just waiting in the wings. Like angry stagehands, impatient for the show to end. Desperate to pack up the props, grab the star, and head for home. 

A shiver of fear shot through the Italian, and he whimpered a name before resuming his prayers. “God, get me out of here!” he begged.

Diverting his eyes back to the lake, and the seemingly fallen star buried therein, the Italian took one final glance, then turned and ran. Fleeing the sight of the trio, who no, did not approach, but instead loomed like shadows beneath the trees. Pitch-black likenesses of men. Faces blank. Their heads, nonetheless, veiled by thick fabric; all three dressed in coarse and ragged robes.

The Italian rushed to the road, his feet pounding on the gravel. Right as he hit the spot where the yellow car had lost control, he stopped, then commenced a more formal and less selfish prayer. “In the Holy Name of Jesus,” he began, and recited lines about protection for him and his loved ones, asking God to seal the lake and break any and all evil snares upon the place.

Repeating the entire prayer three times, the Italian panted, and his voice grew louder. For the first time in years, he didn’t sound like a shrill mouse delighted by life, or panicked or terrified; no sniveling nor whining; just a certain air of strength and an aura of dignity. The Italian raised his chin, and faced the storm clouds, ignoring the trio of men. They weren’t there, they weren’t there...and even if they were, the Italian was no longer concerned. God was on his side: he was sure of it.

And so he shined the flashlight onto the lake, from further away, his attention returned to the man in the car. “And if it’s not too late, God...” he murmured, then sent unspoken thanks and apologies, and a hundred other thoughts to Heaven. Overcome with a sense of grief for whatever had happened. Sobriety kicking in, and the Italian felt a brief resumption of fear, thinking the trio of men were there to collect HIM; to drag _him_ to Hell should he still plan on committing suicide. But somehow, the Italian caught the gist of the sights of that evening. A slow recollection of a yellow car parked outside the house next to his, and a delayed analysis of the ball of light which had shot down from the sky, and, “Oh God,” the Italian cried, for what felt like the millionth time, “if those are my only two friends down there...” 

Again, his prayer went unfinished, for the three eerie shadows near the woods rushed to the lake as if sucked into a black hole above the water. Magnets to the unseen car, yet they couldn’t sink below the surface of the lake the way the white light had sunk. Instead, the shadows hovered above it. A sound akin to sizzling shot up through the air. The rain dying away, yet with every drop upon the three shadows, a fizzing-noise emitted, like a well-aimed mouth was spitting down to extinguish a candle's flame.

Below, in the depths of the lake, a ghost disguised as an orb of white light felt his soul snuffed out by the pressure around him. As he pushed himself through darkness, blind to the sight of the sunken car, Beilschmidt tried to will himself back into his 'full force' size and shape; the true form of a man. Wanting two legs for which to swim, and two arms for which to save Edelstein from the watery grave. Wanting to speak again. Wanting a mouth for which to breathe into his new friend’s mouth, and if only he could have two eyes for which to find the vehicle. Two hands to place upon the metal. A forehead to bust the glass, and a voice to apologize, or greet him. To say anything. Whatever words would be needed. Yet in that moment, the body of the soldier was something Beilschmidt couldn’t materialize as. He sensed the shadows above him, and Hell below. ‘I tried, I tried...I promise, I tried,’ he sent out, as if speaking to Edelstein in a telepathic transmission. Thinking a response might be forthcoming, yet...he heard nothing. And that alone brought him the slightest ounce of comfort, as he let all his energy die out, and with a feeling akin to a punch to the chest, complete with a surge of electricity, as if hot wires had been stabbed to his temples, Beilschmidt opened his eyes, and sat up in bed. _Awake again_. As if he had simply suffered a nightmare. Unable to leave his home, except to visit his grave, lest hooded men grab him and drag him to the place he was destined to spend eternity. -- Not even the Italian’s prayer could undo Beilschmidt’s fate. -- And if he had given up his mission to save Edelstein for the sake of staying on this earth as a ghost, then maybe it was selfish. Maybe it was also foolish to think, 'If he dies, he can avoid the light, and come home to me here.’ Both spirits could avoid a proper afterlife, but how was that fair?! Beilschmidt cringed at the pain as his 'body' reappeared. Whispering to thin air, “Or maybe God will be nice, and let him survive."

Knowing damn well a man can only hold his breath for so long. Yet, stranger things have happened... 

The Italian knew this, and was well on his way to his own car parked in the sand. To climb inside, unfazed by the departure of the three eerie figures, and the quiet and stillness which then pervaded the lake. Well on his way, to driving into town, to find a police man, a tow truck, a fire truck, an ambulance: any and every conceivable authority required to help. God in Heaven could only do so much. And if nothing else, the right people could at least locate the vehicle, and drag it onto dry land...if only for the sake of obtaining a more presentable corpse.

Braced for the worst case scenario. The Italian rolled down his driver’s side window, and tossed out the empty wine bottle near the _Dead End_ sign. Shattered glass landed in a puddle as Lakeside met Vine. Beilschmidt’s house on the horizon, and in a few more hours, sunrise. 


	20. Chapter 20

Beilschmidt rose from his bed, and paced the upstairs hallway of his home. If anyone were there to witness him, they wouldn’t see him.

Not haunting in ‘full force’, but as an invisible fixture, no different than the natural smell of a house. 

He was somehow attached -- in all ways physical, mental, and in spirit -- to the residence, and no matter what happened, he vowed to never leave its walls again. Pacing up and down, and the floorboards creaked. “Oh, stop complaining!” he repeated the words of Edelstein, and who knew ghosts could cry? Tears in his eyes, and Beilschmidt sniffled. Resuming his own prior chant in his mind: ‘I tried, I tried...’

A noise rang out, like a decorative windchime caught in a strong breeze, singing out a few final notes before plummeting to the hard ground. As if the sound and fall took place on Beilschmidt’s front porch. “I don’t own a windy-chime,” he muttered to himself, and imagined someone tossing one at his house in the hopes of gaining entry.

“Maybe it’s Tinker Bell,” he snickered, and then his eyes grew wide. “OR MAYBE IT’S EDELSTEIN!” he screamed out, and raced down the stairs like a madman fueled by a hurricane’s wind speed.

Looking up to the electric bulb illuminated in the foyer, Beilschmidt breathed deep, and appeared as the whitish fog; the size and shape of a soldier. He grabbed a hold of the front door’s knob, and shoved the door open with his elbow. The porch was empty, and daylight was struggling to break. Not a single thing moved, nor did any thing seem ‘new’ or out of place. No windchime tossed upon his threshold. No floating ball of light willing to fly alongside him. To be his partner in crime, if he _were_ akin to Peter Pan. A man who could never grow up, nor leave his Never Never Land: his home, except for his grave, and if Edelstein _had_ perished, Beilschmidt thought, then would the lake be his grave AND his home from now on? Surely a ghost deserves a proper place to haunt. 

“Are you out here, Fussy Pants?” Beilschmidt called while looming on the threshold. “I can’t see you, but I know how that goes,” he laughed. “Maybe you don’t know how to do it yet? See, just imagine yourself as you were, and come stand with me,” he advised, while pointing to the foyer’s bulb. “The electricity seems to help. So do living people, but I guess I'm fresh out of those,” he joked in that morbid way of his. 

Beilschmidt cringed at the subsequent silence. “Fussy Pants??” he whined, and this time, he again heard the noise akin to a windchime. Singing out as if lost in an impenetrable fog. The land blanked out beneath a blanket of stubborn clouds; the sun soon to rise, and a night which wouldn’t leave. Dark, but faded enough to see, should a man come trudging from the woods, meeting his bare feet to the concrete of two damp intersecting streets, reading the signs ‘Lakeside’ then ‘Vine’ with a defeated sigh. The song of a windchime like delicate bells in the distance, playing in sporadic tones, both hushed and brief. To accompany a man with only one thought in his mind: ‘I must make it home.’ 

“Avoid the light, Fussy Pants!” Beilschmidt called out, his hands placed to the sides of his mouth, hoping to amplify his speech. “And follow the sound of my voice, all right?” he pleaded. “I’m over here! Ah, I think I see you!!” 

Beilschmidt squinted his eyes, and sure enough, through the darkness, he spied three men walking up the center of the road. A slim man traveling amid two fishermen; one on the left, and one on the right, both carrying rods, balanced atop their shoulders, and the man in between them seemed intent on buttoning shirt buttons which no longer operated. 

“Indecent,” spat the man in the middle, still fiddling with his shirt as the three of them -- all faint in appearance like pencil sketches lightly colored by pastels --  approached the curb parallel to Beilschmidt’s house. 

“It is you,” Beilschmidt sighed. 

Edelstein lifted his gaze to peer at the house from whence the familiar voice came, yet as he opened his mouth to reply, one of the fishermen interrupted; waving to Beilschmidt, the fisherman hollered, “We found him at the lake!” 

Beilschmidt nodded, and gushed a smile before rushing out onto the front porch. “I thought that’s where I lost him!” And he waved back to the fisherman while saying, “Thanks!”

Edelstein stepped towards the birth of the cobblestone walkway, and glanced back to find the two ghostly escorts glued in place. “I’m grateful too,” he said, and it was rather hard to speak, he decided, almost like his mouth was full of cotton after leaving a dentist appointment. His teeth drilled, and his cavities filled, and there was indeed a taste of something metallic on his tongue. “I can’t thank you enough,” he offered. Struggling to articulate each word, and his own voice sounded a bit foreign to him, and was falling near silent, like a bell rung beneath a heavy weight, or an alarm clock stuffed beneath bed-covers, because a man doesn’t want to wake up in the morning to face another day. 

So he tried to speak louder, for surely it was only a lack of energy. Needing to find a way to harness his enthusiasm for reaching the house and the man so dear to him. Edelstein took a deep breath, and his lungs ached. Whoever said the dead feel no more pain have never walked in their shoes, yet...Edelstein was still barefoot. Dressed the way he died: no socks, no shoes, no coat nor cravat. His shirt unbuttoned like a heathen who rushed out into a stormy night to save a man who chose life, and was now in town at the local police station. 

By the time the Italian would return to the lake and the submerged yellow car, he and whoever he brought with him, would find the vehicle not empty, but the body in the backseat was most definitely void of its usual entity. 

Edelstein’s spirit destined to walk the earth dressed in such a way he deemed improper, but ah, that was the breaks, he supposed. Almost humorous, he eventually found it; Beilschmidt could forever be a soldier, and a dignified snob like Edelstein could forever be dressed like a lazy slob stricken by poverty. Regretting, most of all, his opened dress shirt and the inability to hide his white undershirt, but at least his silver cross necklace would eternally shine exposed.

“I should have put on more clothes before I left,” Edelstein joked as he paced up the cobblestone walkway. “Can you believe it?” he asked, and was delighted to feel his eyes watering. -- Yes, ghosts can cry. ‘No more tears past the gate’ only a rule for those who actually reach Heaven. God can’t save you from death, but he can save you from Hell...choosing to actually meet your maker in person, thus embracing an eternity in an otherworldly paradise isn’t in the rules, however. To linger behind -- ‘avoid the light’ as Beilschmidt put it -- is a choice to be made, especially when clocks aren’t stopped, mirrors aren’t covered, funerals aren’t held, or when death comes sooner than imagined. 

“I didn’t see the lake,” Edelstein admitted, his tone a bit sheepish as he faced Beilschmidt. Smiling at him, as if somewhat ashamed, yet his eyes flickered, joyous to see what felt like an old friend’s face. 

Beilschmidt exhaled in relief, and let himself slide to sitting on the front porch. Wilting to the concrete, arms extended, as if wanting to hug the recently deceased man who within seconds would join him.

“I had a bad feeling,” Beilschmidt said, “as soon as you left, but I couldn’t quite place it.” 

Edelstein climbed the front steps of Beilschmidt’s home, and lowered himself to his knees, crawling the remaining few inches across the porch. “I didn’t,” he said, in reference to having any negative premonition of his fate; the evening marred by a hint which pointed to the Italian’s demise, not his own. Though the face in the water, Edelstein had later thought -- while floating from the car to the shore like an ounce of foam on a wave, to rise and stand in the sand, and peer out at the lake, knowing his body was still underneath; once he realized he was dead -- that perhaps the face had appeared to him in the bathwater to lure him there, but by whom the message was sent, Edelstein was unsure. A trick played by unseen hands; by force or forces unknown. Yet after the fishermen explained to him what had happened -- the why and the how -- and listed the choices available to him, Edelstein couldn't find it in his heart to be mad. At least now he understood whatever quiet thing they had whispered to him. The fishermen long dead inhabitants of a town where they knew the dangers of the lake all too well. Both men having drowned in it years ago themselves.

And so into Beilschmidt’s arms, Edelstein crawled. Both ghosts as clear to each other as any normal human on the face of the earth is clear to another living creature. Existing on the same plane, thus in full color they were rendered to one another; they looked to be flesh and blood, and to their own touch, they felt much the same. No more pencil sketches or outlines or fog or gray smoke, thanks to a reunion under the same roof of the home they’d both haunt. “I guess this is it for us,” Edelstein said, as Beilschmidt wrapped his arms around him tighter, hugging his friend. “I saw the light, though. I heard a band!” 

Beilschmidt laughed. “You could have gone up there and played the violin for all the angels,” he teased. “I can’t believe you weren’t tempted!” 

Edelstein nestled into the hug, lying his ear at Beilschmidt’s chest, half-expecting to hear a heartbeat. No such luck, but he could hear breathing, which one might argue isn’t needed for a ghost, yet...who knows all the unwritten rules of spirits and souls. Entities choosing to stay on this earth, for surely they’re not all trapped nor doomed. “If I had gone up there,” Edelstein said, his words muffled by Beilschmidt’s uniform -- finally appearing in its true shade of deep grayish blue -- “I never would have seen you again, and I knew it.” 

“I’m sorry I didn’t make the list, Fussy Pants,” Beilschmidt said, and tilted his head in an attempt to see Edelstein’s face. Moving one hand from Edelstein’s back, he brushed the dark hair from the forehead of his fellow ghost. Wanting to look into eyes Beilschmidt could always see as violet, yet his own eyes peering down at Edelstein would finally shine in vivid colors as well. Pinks and purples: a hint of red. He waited a moment for Edelstein to look up to him; to meet his gaze. “You think it was worth it?” he asked. Somewhat afraid to hear an honest answer, Beilschmidt blurted, “This house is hardly Heaven.” 

“No, but it’s home,” Edelstein said.


	21. Chapter 21

Rising from the porch, Beilschmidt and Edelstein walked through the opened doorway, hand in hand. Upstairs, to the master bedroom, where the two lied down alongside one another, in the unmade master bed. Edelstein had a long cry, whispering to Beilschmidt about his death. And likewise, Beilschmidt shared the details of his own demise. ‘What did it feel like when all the lights went out?’ and ‘How did the band in Heaven sound?’ were a couple of the questions asked, as the sun broke through the drab skyline, thus illuminating the room.

If anyone were to walk in, and peer down at the bed, they’d see nothing but wrinkled sheets and turned-down covers; a slight indentation in the middle of the mattress. Yes, just one indentation, for the ghosts were embraced so close to one another. Beilschmidt, with his arm draped around Edelstein, who buried his nose at Beilschmidt’s neck, sniffling. “I thought maybe you’d try and save me,” Edelstein said, which was the one line Beilschmidt had hoped not to hear.

With his cheek resting at Edelstein’s forehead, Beilschmidt explained, “You know, it’s a funny thing, Fussy Pants,” and he laughed despite the pain, “I flew to my grave, like always, but I forced a detour. You should have seen me up there!” Punctuating the statement with noises like a jet plane, perhaps befitting of a former pilot; he of all people knew a thing or two about flight and the noises an engine makes while soaring at full speed, or even while plummeting. “I’ve never been able to steer away from my path before, but ah, Fussy Pants,” he said, and reverted to a near-comical whisper, “I zoomed down like I was a bomb dropped to blow you right out of the damn water!” He laughed again, this time faint, and soon segued to a softer tone, as he nuzzled his face into Edelstein’s dark hair. “But when I got down there, I couldn’t see...I couldn’t swim...and,” Beilschmidt choked up a bit before forcing the words, “I knew I was being watched.”

Edelstein lifted his head, peering up to his fellow ghost. “The shadows,” he guessed. “The fishermen told me they saw three lost souls.”

“Old friends of mine,” Beilschmidt joked.

“Hmm,” said Edelstein, and he stared straight ahead -- for whatever reason -- at Beilschmidt’s chin. The strong jawline he saw the first night in his new home, when Beilschmidt had appeared to him in the doorway of that very room. To say nothing of the old photographs in the parlor. The black-and-white shot of two brothers; the faded portrait of a soldier. "You’re more handsome in color,” Edelstein said, not wanting to discuss the shadows any further. Knowing by the tone of the fishermen and their account of what had happened post-accident, the shadows were not of the same world in which humans live, nor destined to the world Edelstein and the fishermen forwent.

“Lucky you,” teased Beilschmidt. “Now you’ll get to see my handsome face every night before you sleep, and every morning when you wake up!”

“And your eyes,” Edelstein said. "The most important part.”

***

The house without a proper owner again; abandoned, as far as the law and the real estate market were concerned. The real estate agent who sold the house to Edelstein would surely have the account returned to him in no time. That same young man learned of Edelstein’s death while sitting at his mother’s dinner table, reading the late edition of the Sunday paper. Headline: **Famous Violinist Plunges to His Death!**

And beneath the boldface text, this article was printed:

> ‘In the overnight hours of January 2nd, popular recording artist Roderich Edelstein crashed his vehicle into Seven Creek Lake. Local officers stated one witness was present at the time of the incident. A man who wishes to remain nameless was patrolling the shores. He claimed Edelstein lost control of his car at the end of Lakeside Drive, and was then unable to escape the vehicle. Officers managed to pull the car from the murky depths at sunrise. Edelstein was pronounced dead at the scene. An official cause of death will later be released. Authorities state it will most likely be ruled an accidental drowning, despite evidence obtained near the crash sight, which points to a possible case of driving while intoxicated.’
> 
> ‘Edelstein was born in Vienna, Austria, on October 26th, 1929. He has no surviving relatives. A funeral will be held in his hometown, and all fans are invited to send their messages of condolences to the following address [...]’

The address belonged to the Italian. He had asked permission from the officers beforehand, and they passed it on to the press. Thinking maybe he’d find solace in reading the letters of bereavement and admiration which could potentially be sent in honor of his late ‘only friend’. So yes, in the coming weeks, mail was sure enough sent to him by Edelstein’s fans, delivered to the Italian's house on Lakeside and Vine. One of only two residences still standing to this day, on the corner where Vine Street intersects with the dead-end road which leads to the man-made lake.

And there, officers had indeed found a broken wine bottle near the _Dead End_ sign. ‘Crazy guy must have been driving a million miles an hour!’ one officer had said. ‘Yeah...must have had a death wish,’ another officer had assumed.

The conversation taking place while loading up the body bag. Zipping up the thick black fabric which housed Edelstein's remains. The last remark made while the second officer had stared down at Edelstein's face; right before tugging the zipper closed, but first, he had likewise shut Edelstein's eyelids with his tired hand. The scent of lake water so strong, you'd think it would have gagged the uniformed men, but in their line of work, they had smelt much worse scents than this; the smell of death not yet sinking in, and Edelstein's body had somehow still looked like a young man merely sleeping. Still smelt like a man who took good care of himself. Still appeared delicate and smoothed-skin, and 'What a waste', a third officer had deemed it, only in thought, as he peered over the shoulder of the second officer who had finished zipping up the bag. Loading the 'cargo' as it were, onto a white stretcher, which would then, in turn, have its wheel-footed metal legs folded neatly beneath itself, while the three of them pushed the stretcher into the back of a white van. No need for an ambulance; not yet time for a hearse. The van directed to carry the cargo to the local morgue, where it'd be stashed in a freezer, to safe-keep it, until it could be loaded up, like a solid wood plank stored in a thick black wrapper, to be delivered unto a separate set of officers in Vienna; the body bag destined for a one-way trip by train.

***

Wearing a faded pink robe, a cup of coffee in her hand, “Are you almost finished with that, Dear?” the mother of the real estate agent said of the newspaper spread out flat atop his lap.

Looming at the table’s edge, she watched her son's eyes well with tears. “Well, what is it?” she asked. “What on earth is wrong now??”

The real estate agent peered up at her a moment, then glanced away. Knowing it would sound silly to mourn for a man he had only just met. But then again, she too enjoyed Edelstein’s music. And of his company on New Year’s Eve, she had bragged for hours to all her friends. ‘My son sold a house to a real artist!’ she had said, recounting the story countless times on the phone New Year’s Day. ‘He even came over and drank wine with us! Such a gorgeous gentleman.’

And now the world -- or at least the locals and his fans -- would assume Edelstein was a drunk who crashed his car while on a bender.

“Of all the defaming things!!” Edelstein would later scream, upon reading the Sunday paper for himself. “Those bastards and their logic! I didn’t break that wine bottle. I’ve never been drunk a day in my life!” he’d lie.

Of course, he already knew there was a wine bottle busted beneath the _Dead End_ sign, for he saw it himself while walking home with the two fishermen who haunted the small town. Edelstein had simply assumed it was some drunk passerby too undignified to know not to litter. ‘Only trash throws out their trash on roadsides,’ he had probably remarked beneath his breath while fumbling with inoperable shirt buttons.

“But it wasn’t my bottle...I was sober!” he’d continue to argue and rant with no one and anyone, unheard by a single soul, save for poor Beilschmidt, who’d be forced to listen to it until the end of all time.

***

The house empty, except for two ghosts, and perhaps a haunted painting in the parlor downstairs.

Now, with Edelstein dead, to whom would the house belong? The real estate agent shook his head that Sunday, drying his tears on his late father’s necktie. He tried to assure himself, 'Someone will buy it. Now that a famous man lived there!' But he remained unconvinced, considering the house was too old and too haunted, and thus no one in their right mind had ever wanted it.

“Yes, but he did,” the agent whispered of Edelstein. “Wasn’t he in his right mind??”

The real estate agent was unsure. Muttering, “I suppose...” to cap his mostly-unspoken line of thought; to answer himself, while finally passing the newspaper to his mom. “But if you ask me, Mr. Edelstein had a good reason to get drunk last night,” the agent said, despite knowing damn well his mother possessed no prior knowledge in regards to what, exactly, her son was referencing, as he stood from the table, and headed to the nearest exit. “I bet you a million dollars that ghost drove him to drink! I bet he was trying to escape...no wonder he drove to the lake!!”

And with that, the agent heard his mother gasp. Over his shoulder, he glanced back to her, witnessing her slumped posture, and her wide eyes, staring at the photograph of Edelstein which accompanied the article.

She ran her fingers across his black-and-white image.

“That poor, poor man,” she cried.

***

The house would have to be bought and sold again: the real estate agent and the deceased duo all knew it. Good thing one of them was rich...

“I have the perfect idea!” Edelstein boasted, when he and Beilschmidt awoke from their slumber, that Sunday afternoon. “I can’t make a will, that’s for sure,” he sort of laughed to himself, imagining a specter making an appointment with a lawyer! Yes, a ghost walking downtown barefoot, and sitting across from a man in a suit, the latter terrified at his desk, in some fancy legal office. -- Edelstein, however, COULD walk downtown, if he so desired. For ghosts who avoid Heaven as their designated afterlife are not tied only to their former residence and their final resting place. Such as the fishermen who roamed the town, doing as they pleased.

Edelstein didn’t know it yet, but he could even venture outside in the daylight!

Unlike Beilschmidt. The ghost who avoided Hell could hardly stand the afternoon sunlight seeping in through their bedroom window.

Groaning out a complaint, he tossed and turned atop the mattress. “Make it go away!” Beilschmidt grumbled. “And go make some pancakes!!”

“Would you stop with that?!” Edelstein snapped as he climbed from the bed. “I can hardly make pancakes for you now...or can I?” he asked.

Beilschmidt lifted his head from the pillow and smiled, “I don’t know, Fussy Pants, but there’s one way to find out.”

“You won’t be able to eat them,” Edelstein said, and he felt it strange to discuss such trivial matters all over again. “This is what life will be, I suppose,” he noted, as he traipsed past the mirror above the bureau. “Everything on repeat. The same thing, over and over...”

Glancing down at Beilschmidt’s collection of ceramic birds, he added, “You’ll get tired of me eventually, you know.”

“And then I can throw you out the chimney, and you can grow wings, and fly up to Heaven,” Beilschmidt threatened in jest. “What do you think I am? A wasteful man?? I’m not letting you go.” Beilschmidt sat up in bed, and rubbed his eyes with one hand, and motioned to Edelstein with the other, claiming, “You’re stuck with me now, Fussy Pants! Not the other way around...so remember that.”

***

As the day progressed, the two ghosts explored the house again, this time with Beilschmidt teaching Edelstein the joy of walking through walls, and forgoing the arduous task of climbing the stairs: flying up and down them instead.

“It is rather fun!” Edelstein laughed.

“Now you won’t be tired anymore,” Beilschmidt said. “Well...a little tired,” he guessed. “You get ran down like a battery, sometimes.”

“I remember,” said Edelstein. “Recharging, right?”

“Mmm-hmm,” Beilschmidt nodded. “At least now I won’t have to worry about you passing out, and me having to carry you around. Or maybe!” he brightened at the change of thought. “Maybe now I can carry you just for the hell of it!!”

“If by ‘hell’ you mean sweetness,” Edelstein corrected, “I’ll take it.”

And so Beilschmidt approached Edelstein at the foot of the stairs, and scooped him into his arms. Edelstein held his own hands tight to the back of Beilschmidt’s neck, staring at him soft-eyed, like a bride ready to be escorted to bed on her wedding night.

Levitating with ease up the downstairs hallway, “I’ll never know if you were too heavy or not,” said Beilschmidt, “I mean, for a ghost to carry you around." Clarifying in a rueful tone, as if he regretted not trying to lift his new friend while he was still alive, just so Beilschmidt could prove his strength. But he glanced down to Edelstein with a sympathetic smile, stating the obvious: “You’re weightless now. Same as me.”


	22. Chapter 22

Upon entering the kitchen, Beilschmidt -- still carrying his fellow ghost in his arms, still peering down at him, still smiling; both men smiling, and it was nice to spend an afternoon in a mood akin to well-rested newlyweds, home at last after a honeymoon marred by mishap -- ceased his floating a few inches from the fridge, and set Edelstein to his bare feet. “So what was this perfect idea of yours, anyway?” Beilschmidt asked, as Edelstein unhanded him; drawing his delicate grasp from Beilschmidt's neck, careful not to muss the lapel of his now-in-color Luftwaffe uniform. “The one you woke up to, bragging about??” he squinted, a delayed burst of confusion over the admission in the bedroom. 

“Ah,” said Edelstein, delighted by the reminder, “it’s about this house...I know who our caretaker should be!” 

Beilschmidt cocked his head, and explained, “It’s not that easy, Fussy Pants. It’s not like we get a say in it! Trust me.” 

“Well, you had a say in it, didn’t you?” Edelstein snapped. “You wanted me to move in, and I did.”

He turned away with busy hands, fussing about, digging through kitchen drawers in search of a dishtowel. Hoping to find one large enough to drape over the uncovered window, near to which Beilschmidt lingered; the older ghost cringing at the afternoon sunlight pouring in.

“You should have hung curtains in here,” Edelstein critiqued. “Or I should have...yesterday. When I still had the chance.” 

“Oh, be quiet with that,” said Beilschmidt. “All the stuff you could have done over the next fifty years, and here you are, worried about curtains!” 

“Yes, but...”

“But nothing,” Beilschmidt interrupted. “You’ve got hands, don’t you? You can pick stuff up. It’s not rocket science!” he laughed. “And plus, you saw me carry your ass in here like an armload of feathers. So don’t you think,” he narrowed his eyes, speaking slower, as if hoping to remind Edelstein of his potential abilities, “you can still dress this place up? We don’t need a caretaker, you and I. We’ll manage. I’ve been fine without anyone. I didn’t need you to move in, and we sure as hell don’t want some scaredy-cat living here, not if they're gonna throw fits about us!” 

“Yes, but I...” Edelstein tried again, “I wanted to do it like a normal person,” he whined. “I wanted to help you. I wanted to...” 

“Be like a little housewife, and make this place pretty. I get it, Fussy Pants,” said Beilschmidt, “but you’re missing the whole point! You can still go on, same as you planned. And I’ll help you get used to it. We’ll even pretend we’re some little married couple living here, if that floats your boat. We just need the small things. I’ll sweep the floor every night, and you can make coffee just so we can smell it, all right?”

“Hmm,” said Edelstein, and let a dishtowel fall to the countertop. Spreading it out nice and neat with his fingers. “I think I’d like that, maybe.” 

“Uh-huh,” said Beilschmidt. “We’re not useless.”

The words spoken to Edelstein's back; delivered with a semblance of poignancy as he approached the new ghost who stood before him. Wrapping his arms around Edelstein’s waist. Rubbing his nose to Edelstein’s shoulder. Sniffing at him just to see if he still smelt nice. Lifting his head, and kissing Edelstein’s neck just to see what he tasted like, and to find out if he could even kiss a fellow ghost. Unsure, so he tried; kissing at least one inch of him. Thinking it best to pace himself, for who knew what the two of them could get up to now! A couple of entities, dressed for eternity in the clothes they died in, so no, they could do nothing TOO obscene; not due to a total lack of bodies, for in their eyes only, they had those, but the clothes were indeed a permanent part of their existence, like cotton-stuffed dolls with stitched-on garments.

Beilschmidt found the whole concept fascinating and funny, yet he breathed out deep near Edelstein’s ear. Emitting a rather libidinous sound, which was strange to Edelstein, considering Beilschmidt was nothing more than a spirit, and what could drive a soul to want such physical things?! Not to mention, so suddenly; so soon after Edelstein's death.

“You shouldn’t do that,” said Edelstein. “We need to figure this thing out! Using our hands, and doing housework, and walking around like a couple of men just living in a house. Fine. But that won’t take care of everything,” he argued. “What about the legal stuff? What about money??” He slunk down, and twisted about, thus pulling away from Beilschmidt’s grasp. “See, that’s what I’ve been trying to tell you,” Edelstein smiled, mostly at the success of his sneaky maneuver. “I have that briefcase you hid from me yesterday...it’s full of money!” 

“All right, so what of it?” Beilschmidt asked. Growing irritated, he yanked at the fridge handle; opening the door, and riffling about through the paper sack filled with groceries. Retrieving the can of fish chowder, he lifted it to his face, and laughed: “This stuff looks disgusting!”

Edelstein shook his head, dismissing Beilschmidt’s attempt to change the subject. “Pay attention!” he shouted, batting at the can and then grabbing it. “You want to talk about soup, or do you want to talk about us?!” 

“I want to know why you buy such yucky things at the store, Fussy Pants.” 

“I bought it for you!” Edelstein spat. “How was I supposed to know what you like and don’t like. I...” he halted his ensuing line, deciding the whole argument silly; realizing Beilschmidt didn’t want to talk about money, nor the ownership of his house, and of course Edelstein nigh on fell right into his feeble little trap of distraction. “Listen, _Husband_ ,” Edelstein teased, “I’m going to give my entire fortune to our neighbor over there,” he said, pointing the soup can towards the kitchen window, directing Beilschmidt’s attention to the house next door, “and HE can buy this house for us! He can buy his own house, if it’s not already paid for. Ah! And I’m gonna make sure that nice agent and his mother get several thousand dollars more. I'd hate for anyone to suffer when they’re to thank for letting me find you again,” Edelstein beamed. “If I had failed to see that listing in the paper last week, I'd never have known this dusty old house even existed. I would never have known it was the Beilschmidt house, and I tell you, when I saw that name in print, I knew it had to be you! I knew it...” he mused, almost to himself, as if lost in some romantic daydream. “The Beilschmidt house, for sale, reduced price, fully-furnished,” Edelstein quoted the advertisement he had read. “That’s why I rushed down here to tour it on New Year’s Eve. That’s why I bought it outright with cash. And don’t you see?” he asked, lowering the can to his side. “I can let the Italian buy it, and you and I can stay here and not worry about anyone ever living here again. Just me and you, and we’ll be like humans, and you can do all those little things you were trying to do a moment ago, and I promise, never again will I try and stop you.” 

“Are you finished now?” Beilschmidt asked, refusing to look up from the pack of cigarettes he had found in the paper sack. Cringing at them a moment, hoping to God Edelstein had bought the disgusting things for the soldier's sake, like the soup, perhaps due to mistaking Beilschmidt for the sort of old captain who sits around smoking. 'Gross,' he thought. 'If those are for him...I hate smokers, so no, _ha ha_ , he bought them for me, the big dummy.' Not wanting to admit there might be a blight on his otherwise 'nice...too nice...aw, hell, he's practically perfect' assessment of Edelstein's character. Driving himself back on track for once, to bury the line of thought, Beilschmidt resumed his inquiry:

“You really think if you give that ditzy guy all your money, he’ll just buy this place and do anything we say??” 

“Yes, I do,” said Edelstein, matter-of-fact. “I know he will! He owes me. He likes me. And...” Edelstein drew a deep breath. “He loved your brother, same as...” but he feared stating the rest. He glanced down to the soup can, and likewise balked at the picture on its label; the image of the thick white goop known as fish chowder. “It is rather disgusting, isn’t it?” he laughed. Cheeks reds, he lifted his chin, and peered back to Beilschmidt, who was inspecting the eggs in the fridge. As if nothing of importance was being decided or discussed. “I always liked your brother,” Edelstein said. “But you’re mine, and your brother belonged to him,” he explained, motioning to the window to signify the Italian’s house again. “The two Beilschmidts,” he smiled. “So yes. I’m sure he’ll help us!” 

“All right,” said Beilschmidt, snapping the carton closed before slamming the fridge door shut with his knee. He turned, holding one egg in his hand. “You give all your money away, and you and I can just stay here ‘til the house falls to pieces, right? So then what happens??” 

“We’ll sleep in the dust, I guess."

“Maybe you can put a tent on my grave, and sleep in that,” joked Beilschmidt. 

“So it’s a deal? I mean...” Edelstein grinned, taking one step towards his fellow ghost, but he feared the egg in Beilschmidt’s hand. Something about the way he toyed with it -- nestled in his fist -- made Edelstein think the egg was destined to be smashed all over his forehead! “It’s a brilliant idea, and you don’t mind if I go through with it??” Choosing the Mister Nice Guy routine. Asking permission. “I’d hate for us to have to share this place with strangers now that we’re...” 

“If you say ‘in love’ or some girly nonsense like that,” groaned Beilschmidt, “I’m gonna make you wear egg yolk where eyeglasses should be!” 

“Well, that’s exactly why I’ll never tell you,” scoffed Edelstein. “But I meant,” he admitted, softening his tone, “now that we’re both deceased.” 

Beilschmidt looked down at the egg, and sort of petted it. “Could have been a bird, you know, if some wise guy hadn’t swiped it.” 

“And you could have let me finish my sentence instead of accusing me of love.”

***

As if it were tantamount to committing a crime: to be in love with someone he met at age seven, and wanted to live in a house with him, literally for _old time’s sake_. To spend every day and night with someone he knew, and knew him, back then. And now all eternity would be spent with someone who didn’t want to hear how he felt. Thinking it obvious, considering what he did; the path he chose. How he felt, even when they were kids. How living with him, despite the short duration, only amplified it. “You act like love is a four-letter word!” Edelstein finally hissed. 

“The last time I checked,” said Beilschmidt, "it is.”

And without glancing over to his projected target, Beilschmidt tossed the single egg at the sink.

It cracked against the basin, exploding yolk atop the drain.

He rushed over, smirking at the broken shell, yet he stared at it wide-eyed, as if surprised the egg had failed to survive intact. 

“You fool,” said Edelstein. “Why waste it??”

As if the two could even eat it. The whole carton would go to waste if the Italian didn’t show up for a visit soon! And he could raid the fridge and take the cigarettes and food. He could tell Beilschmidt of what he witnessed at the lake, and he could even find out for sure if Edelstein was a ghost now, too. -- Assuming the Italian suspected it...no, at the moment, he was sleeping, or at least curled up in bed, whining to God, or to the ceiling, or to the memory of his lost lover, "My first real friend," and the words seemed more like the lyrics to a song stuck in his head. Something he'd later hum while pacing his own floors; his own pale-lit home. Truly the tragic figure in his own rotten scenario.

“I know what would cheer you up!” said Beilschmidt. “All this talk about money, and such...” he trailed off, and looked about, devising a plan. 

“I don’t need cheering up!” shouted Edelstein. “I’m excited about this. Really I am,” he said of his desire to have the Italian purchase the home for them. “You’re the one who doesn’t want to discuss any thing like a civilized human being. Throwing things! Laughing at cans...” 

“I tell ya what, Fussy Pants,” Beilschmidt said, still diverting from Edelstein’s idea. “Let’s go upstairs, and I’ll show you something. Sound fun?” 

“Well, as long as you’re finished sulking,” agreed Edelstein. “And you’ll grow up and discuss this with me,” he added to his list of requirements. “And no more funny business just yet! We have the rest of all time for that nonsense.”

“Nope, nope,” chanted Beilschmidt with a laugh. “I’ve got something to show you! Something that’ll make you happy." Nodding his head 'yes' -- so utterly convinced an adventure was the grand ticket to improving their day -- he damn near sang, "I promise, you’re gonna like it."

And with that, Beilschmidt grabbed a hold of Edelstein’s arm, and pulled him forward. The two ghosts drifting from the kitchen to the stairwell within seconds. Up the flight of stairs, the two levitated, and Beilschmidt glanced over just to see the warm smile on Edelstein’s face.

“That’s your favorite part, isn’t it?” Beilschmidt teased. “I knew it would be. But just wait ‘til we play on the roof tonight!” 

“Can we dance up there?” Edelstein asked, reminded of yesterday’s dream. 

“Sure we can!” said Beilschmidt; purring a postscript, “I’ll dip you by the chimney.” 


	23. Chapter 23

The two drifted down the upstairs hall until they passed through the wall of the ‘broom room’. The broom itself still lying lifeless in the center, and all the unlit candles still scattered about the baseboards. 

As he eyed the floor, Edelstein asked, "Just where did you ever find that thing?" in reference to the straw-bristled broom, recollecting a conversation which took place around that same time yesterday afternoon; he and the ghost had conversed in the bedroom about brooms and clocks, and a small plush cat Edelstein hoped to God wasn't in the trunk of his once-submerged car. Assuming he'd ever see the yellow vehicle again, he supposed he could dig through the trunk, and gather his boxed-up things, and retrieve the painting his mother created way back when. 1936, was it? No matter; the small plush cat pained him most of all, thinking he'd never again get to cuddle with the one item symbolic of his birth year. Partially due to Beilschmidt putting so much importance on a person owning such an item; he and his precious ceramic bird marked 1922. But still...to never lay eyes on the painting again: that also pained Edelstein. Considering it depicted he and West as kids.

Imagining the paint ran, and now the canvas was blank. No, surely it had been sealed in some form or fashion. Unable to recall whether or not his mother was so careful with her creations. Too bad she hadn't sealed her own son in varnish! Waterproofed him. But if skin were coated in a glossy or even matte-like veneer, surely pores would be clogged, and the body unable to breathe. Unable to move. Skin rendered too tight and brittle, due to chemicals. Stiff and solid, like a statue. And God knows, waterproofed or not, a statue of a man would sink quicker than flesh.

Calling to mind his own appearance; thinking of how he must have looked while seeking shelter, searching for air, in the backseat of his yellow car...and Edelstein couldn't quite comprehend the scene. He was anything but a statue in those last few moments of his mortal life, though he struggled to envision just how on earth he managed to end up in that backseat. The interior of the car pitch-black, underwater at Two Something AM, with a storm above, leaving him to paw for sharp objects in the dark. Blinded, and panicked, and it was all just a will to live that drove him into the furthermost reaches of his vehicle. A statue, meanwhile, wouldn't have budged an inch. Just sink to the rough floor of the lake, and stare out wide-eyed, never flinching. As if caught in a staring contest with death. And winning! Since a statue never has a life, it has nothing to lose, and can stare death in the eyes, but once it 'wins' it can't even smile. And it's not like Edelstein didn't try to survive. He challenged it for as long as he could -- put up a good fight; just like Beilschmidt, _he tried, he tried_ \-- but his lack of strength, his fear of water, the total darkness: a long list of contributing causes. Leading to the last few seconds of his former life, and it came back to him now like a scene from a movie. As if watching a black-and-white tragedy unfold in a cinema, where he was the sole member of the audience yet also the sole actor on the screen. And it struck him in this way, for the last few seconds of his former existence were witnessed while inside and yet outside of his own body; somehow in two places simultaneously. And that was the strangest part of his death; the split second when his soul left his body; when it was released from the 'statue' of himself; when the physical size and shape of a man breathes out a ghost, letting it seep from the unsealed pores; allowing it to pass through. Freedom, relief: there were positive attributes, but all the pain was transferred. Pain that would eventually drift away. It's not like Beilschmidt had horrible headaches every day, so why should Edelstein expect his lungs to continue to ache?

He found the soreness had already subsided after sleeping for a while, which further reaffirmed the obvious: he existed as two separate beings. The soul and the body. Only one had received permanent damage; only one ceased to function. For here his soul stood in the onset of a room, staring at a lifeless broom, wishing it would spring to life and sweep the floors for him. But of course it didn't move. Same as his body lied lifeless in a freezer; stashed in a morgue. Stretched out on a cold hard slab or still in its black bag. Unmoving. Not breathing. Just to spite this thought, Edelstein drew the deepest breath he could, then clarified his question. "I do remember you stating you couldn't find a broom in order to sweep up the broken glass in the foyer." And he tossed out a couple more reminders: "Your bare hands? The bulb that blew..." 

Beilschmidt, who had been idling nearby, happy to hum some silly tune, let go of Edelstein's hand and soon hovered about the broom like a child easing his way in circular laps around a shallow kiddie pool. Sort of reclining, facing Edelstein as he 'swam' backwards, his legs stretched out somewhat, and bending his black combat boots at the ankles; stretching, and then relaxing, swishing his legs if only slightly, until he glanced down to the broom with an odd impish grin. "That old thing?" he asked, and then quickly reverted his gaze back up to Edelstein, before shutting his eyes in a prideful manner. So cool and calm, and of course he had found it, his demeanor seem to say. Offering no immediate answer; at least not in any audible way. Choosing just to be boastful a moment by letting the silence speak for him; allowing Edelstein a chance to imagine anything and everything. Maybe some awesome feat of amateur detective work on Beilschmidt's part. As if the captain had headed some elaborate search to track down the object, like a cop scrounging for clues in the mysterious case of a missing person. The broom a victim of kidnapping, and it had to be rescued-- the case had to be solved -- before Edelstein awoke from his nap yesterday afternoon.

Indeed, while Edelstein had slept, Beilschmidt had finished several chores, including his one-man hunt to discover the true location of the formerly 'borrowed' object. Fancying himself an excellent sleuth, Beilschmidt had crept through every corner and crevice of his home, desperate to find the broom; knowing he had owned one for years, but where the hell was it?! Oh yes, it had all come back to him clear at one point: that darn ditzy Italian must have snatched it from the kitchen closet! Where Beilschmidt had always kept his broom and other supplies for cleaning. In fact, several things seemed to be missing, Beilschmidt had noted while Edelstein napped away a portion of New Year's Day. Not only was his broom most definitely absent, but so were a mop and bucket, and one of those iconic feather dusters like maids always use. 

Realizing he hadn't seen those objects in some such years -- though to be honest, he hadn't quite searched for them, nor missed them, until Edelstein moved in; but in his younger years, Beilschmidt was indeed the avid housekeeper; always cleaning his home thoroughly when he actually was at home, before his death, yet once he was killed and returned to his home on December 31st, 1943, keeping the house decent wasn't exactly top priority, especially since he could no longer drink a beer after his chores were completed -- it likewise dawned on him, those objects had most likely gone missing around the same time the Italian had last visited. Not counting his trip the night prior...no, the Italian had ventured over, some time in the recent past, and upon recalling that day during Edelstein's nap, Beilschmidt had a 'vision is twenty/twenty in hindsight' moment: finally making sense of that visit, and of a strange rattling-sound he had heard in the kitchen while hiding in his attic space. A whole hour he had spent there! An hour wasted; the ghost curled up on thin air, just wondering if a giant dust bunny was downstairs, helping himself to a ham sandwich. Meanwhile, the day of that noise, the real estate agent had also been present, but was somewhere on the second floor, busy giving a tour to a nervous-looking geezer who Beilschmidt had hoped _wouldn't_ buy his home! For although he was lonely at times, and longed for a person or whole family to move in, he didn't necessarily want 'just anyone' living there. Thinking it best if the new occupant(s) had a sense of humor and a stable state of mind, so bumps in the night, and the occasional prank, and the general existence of a ghost in their wake wouldn't disturb them, nor lead them to running off in a state of panic; or worse yet, wouldn't inspire them to bring in a priest!

And yes, Beilschmidt was more than aware of the Italian promising the real estate agent, 'I'll get a priest to perform an exorcism...just please let me come inside and play for a while!' That darn ditz. Didn't he realize?? If Beilschmidt were exorcised, assuming such things actually worked -- Beilschmidt didn't know for sure, but erring on the safe-side, he assumed they did, and therefore hoped with all his soul, the Italian would never do such a thing; never go through with his promise, but also knowing the Italian better than the real estate agent did, due to the stories imparted to him by West, along with the letters he had read, and even by speaking to the Italian himself post-Beilschmidt's-death, he rather doubted the Italian meant half of what he said, in regards to such things, and deemed the promises flimsy at best -- then Beilschmidt would dissolve, at the end of the religious practice, and yes, the house would be free of him, much to the real estate agency's delight, but where would that leave him? Floating off into space for a final time. Bracing himself for a bright light which would only shatter like harsh-lit glass. Raining down in fatal shards. To pierce him through the heart. No band to play a welcoming song. To welcome him home, into the loving arms of the family members and fellow soldiers and friends who died before him, or even after. No, he'd tumble back to the earth, and the ground would open up and swallow his spirit whole. He'd plummet on to Hell. And there, he'd spend his days, not existing in the company of a handsome gentleman such as Edelstein. Scorched by fire instead of reunited with the old friend who once belonged to his little brother; unable to continue on this earthly plane long enough to know someone out there actually wanted to be close to him again; to remain by his side forever.

Edelstein's long-winded confession in the kitchen several minutes prior, about seeing the advertisement in the newspaper -- the one he had read and then quoted -- listing the house for sale, made Beilschmidt realize this living arrangement was no accident. Edelstein had drove to the lakeside town, just to tour an old dusty house, all because he saw the name 'Beilschmidt' in bold black print.

Odd to know it was all premeditated, but nevertheless, the revelation played like a lovely song in the back of Beilschmidt's mind. Helping to fuel his mischievous smile...

"The broom," he finally said, raising one hand in a flippant fashion -- eyes still shut as if it were all so _elementary, my dear Watson_ \-- "was in the last place I thought to check."

\-- As if that explained anything!

But Edelstein simply shrugged, happy to hear any answer at all. Having toyed with bleaker thoughts in the interim silence.

His treks about the broom abandoned, Beilschmidt floated his way back to Edelstein's side. Grabbing his hand, he sort of swung it, like two kids on a playground, one of them impatient to hurry up and go make good use of a contraption. Perhaps a merry-go-round, or a seesaw, or better yet, a swing set. "I nicked it from the back porch," Beilschmidt admitted in a funny sort of whisper. A tone akin to a man who had just committed a comical act of revenge. "I think that neighbor of ours outsmarted me for a while," he added, still keeping his voice low, as if somehow the Italian could overhear him from all the way next door. The so-called friendly neighbor finally stirring from his bed. Rising to face another afternoon alone. Petting his cat, and smiling at the sign on his bedroom door. The text Edelstein had failed to decipher: the Italian read it aloud to himself like reciting a prayer. Calmer now, though he wasn't quite sure how to go about living his next fifty-or-so years without that first new friend he had found in almost a decade. Thinking he and Edelstein could have been the best of friends; the Italian drinking wine while the refined Mr. Edelstein sipped his daily tea, and the two could have talked about the Beilschmidt brothers, and the war, and their families. Such pleasant days would never be spent, but then again...just as soon as the Italian showed up for another visit, wouldn't he be in for a nice surprise! Edelstein may not have been alive anymore -- no, the police force and the press and the local coroner had already made sure of that: it was official; all in print; his frigid body identified by the Italian himself, and his full obituary drafted; his funeral being planned by strangers in Vienna that very minute -- but here he stood, breathing air just as easy as you please, and holding hands with a grinning war casualty. 

So yes, the Italian could still have a friend in Mr. Edelstein. If he didn't mind the new ghost sitting quietly, just staring at the wine. Just smelling the tea. Beilschmidt could meanwhile busy himself with the housekeeping. Sweeping up dust, lest Edelstein's lungs grow irritated again.

Breathing in deep the cool air of the broom room, Edelstein exhaled as if the air itself were an aphrodisiac. Such a blessing...something people often forget to enjoy; one of the many small things he was now grateful for; the ability to breathe, and the pleasure he found in its simplicity. It felt good not to need his body in order to do it. To not need a physical brain in order to complete such a task, or any action, for that matter. His consciousness still existed; full of thought, and even new ideas for music he hoped to write in the birth of that new year. 1955 could be _his_ year; the year he wrote a whole symphony! Why not? Who would stop him?? Beilschmidt would surely cheer him on, and eventually, maybe the Italian could even go out and buy a piano for him. Have 'Roderich Edelstein' engraved in the wood, like his tombstone would soon denote. They could also carve 'Rest in Peace' somewhere near the black and white keys. Or perhaps 'Intermezzo'...for that's what it felt like now: from the time he set foot in that house on New Year's Eve, 'til the time he ran out into the rain, to go to the Italian's house, and then on to his last drive ever to the shores of a flooded lake. Those thirty-some-odd hours were now much like an intermezzo; a connecting piece. From the moment in his life when he learned the house of Captain Beilschmidt was for sale, and having recently heard tales of a home haunted by a gruff ghost in uniform, he could only presume...and he knew; in his heart, he knew it all along...never thinking the ghost would be West, his childhood friend, for Edelstein, before touring the house, didn't even know West was dead! And as for any elder Beilschmidt -- such as the father or the grandfather of the two brothers -- being the notorious spook of the cottage-style dwelling on Lakeside and Vine, well, Edelstein didn't assume it was, for the tales he had heard while living in his makeshift home, told to him like scandalous gossip, thanks to the chatty old lady who came to clean for him twice a week, concerned a haunted house in a lakeside town, containing the spirit of a rather boastful soldier who'd play harmless-enough tricks but would then make harsh and frightening noises, thus scaring away people who sought to buy his home. Or so said the cleaning lady, feeding rumors to Edelstein, which he later declared were true, upon hearing the disembodied voice for himself the first time:

_'Do you always speak to inanimate objects?'_

A question never answered, and now it bridged his former desire to move into a home that would serve to remind him of a time when he was happy -- his life before the war -- with his now post-life existence. Living in the house, this time as a spirit who could pace the halls, never wishing they were well-lit, for really, the home looked fine as is. Just dusty, and a tad bit quiet. A piano would remedy that, all right. And God knows Edelstein had enough money to not only buy the Beilschmidt house again -- this time in the Italian's name, of course -- and the neighboring house if need be, not to mention the extra thousand he'd have the Italian give to the agent and his mother...yes, even after all that, the Italian could buy a piano for Edelstein, for despite his career and fame centering on a violin, Edelstein had always regretted not making a name for himself as a pianist, and to a lesser extent, as a writer of symphonies.

There was still time; surely, even after death, a man can pursue his dreams!

And what a symphony it would make...to write of his death, without using words. Just songs he could play to convey the sad message, though perhaps 'sad' was too obstructive a label; it was more 'bittersweet' than anything. His life had to end sooner or later, Edelstein affirmed, yet only in thought, while Beilschmidt seemed quite content to fiddle with his fingers; sort of pinching at Edelstein's ring finger, for whatever reason, as they both stood in momentary silence. Just letting the day pass by them. And what else can two ghosts do with a day?

A lazy Sunday; a chance to rest before the upcoming week. The brief hush upon the two spirits, and Edelstein squinted, then flinched in pain, as Beilschmidt's pinching turned in to some funny game of Edelstein having his wrist squeezed tightly. Maybe Beilschmidt was checking for a pulse just to make sure Edelstein didn't have something Beilschmidt didn't have! Ah, he wasn't quite sure...whatever the older ghost had in mind, but in Edelstein's head, he continued to ponder his former existence as compared to his new one. Plus the odd bridge in between, for there was still an ongoing investigation, apparently. 'Just where did that wine bottle come from?' Edelstein wondered. And it would still take several days for the realization to finally dawn on him; like a slap to the face, he'd later see the big picture, and scream, 'That damn Italian!!'

Oh yes, Edelstein would eventually think of it. How no one else -- at least no one human -- was at the lake when Edelstein crashed into it, and so who else but a nightly wine-drinker could have thrown that bottle at the _Dead End_ sign. What a fit he'd throw, however, when the papers would never realize it the way he did. Or if they did realize it, they'd fail to ever retract their original hypothesis of 'driving while intoxicated'.

But the investigation was still pending, and Edelstein figured they'd somehow check his blood alcohol concentration. How medical examiners go about such things, Edelstein had no idea, but he imagined a postmortem, or test, would take place before they buried him. And this thought led to him trying to picture his grave. Would he ever fly there and visit it the way Beilschmidt often flew to his own grave? No, Edelstein wasn't even in the slightest bit tempted. He never wanted to see it. Never wanted to read his name etched in to any thing except the piano he hoped he could convince the Italian to buy for his and Beilschmidt's home. Maybe the older ghost would even let the piano-movers set the glorious instrument in the stomach-turning parlor. That'd be the best place for it, after all. Or so Edelstein decided while having his pulse checked. His ring finger checked. 'Is he trying to figure out the size??' Edelstein guessed, as his finger was being checked for the second or third time. A bit giddy over his silent decision to put a piano near the fireplace, so he could write symphonies while Beilschmidt sat in his armchair pretending to choke down coffee, and the two could glare at an empty space above the mantel, and giggle to themselves, joyous smiles on their pale faces over the fact a painting depicting an older soldier burned in the fireplace, for yes, Edelstein still planned to toss the art to the flames! Suspecting just who on earth had sent that message in the tub the night prior. Altering his facade in such a way to trick Edelstein into essentially running off and into the nearby lake. Surely Beilschmidt's Old Man was to blame, for who else appeared only as a face? And that likeness of the Italian had indeed looked like a painting...but then again, Edelstein supposed, it could have had something to do with those three lost souls. Maybe Edelstein was just a ruse in a grander scheme. Maybe the dark figures -- the trio who stuck mostly to the shadows beneath the trees -- had caught wind somehow of new life breathing in Beilschmidt's house; maybe they had spotted the candles through the windows; maybe they had watched Edelstein move in, though no, ghosts from Hell couldn't have been watching, since Edelstein moved in during daylight hours. They just...they couldn't have done it. Only to lure Edelstein and then Beilschmidt to the lake? Using Edelstein like a pawn in a game. Sending a message to create worry in the heart of a living man just so he'd rush out, and have the dead man follow him?? How could they have known...

They couldn't: or so Edelstein adamantly believed, hence his mind returned to blaming the ghost from the painting downstairs in the parlor. Maybe he was jealous of a new person living here, and wanted to spook him into leaving. Maybe it was the Old Man all along! As in, maybe he was the one responsible for scaring away the past potential buyers, since Beilschmidt seemed more than pleased to share his home. Of course, Edelstein didn't know that Beilschmidt himself did in fact scare people away, sometimes on purpose, sometimes on accident, just depending on the day, his mood, and most of all, whether or not he liked the sight, smell, and sound of those on tour.

'If he did do it,' Edelstein resolved of Beilschmidt's ghostly grandfather, 'then perhaps he saw something his grandson didn't.'

Thinking maybe, just maybe, this man entranced by a ring finger, this man hellbent on making sure his companion was without a pulse, this man who stood beside him...maybe he was so fond of Edelstein, that the grandfather had designed a way to make sure the two existed on the same plane. Just as Edelstein had said in the parlor last night. If he had died due to a handcrafted noose at age seven, then at least he and Beilschmidt would be on the same plane. The same level of existence. Both as spirits in a world of human beings. And so, if such a thing happened, although Edelstein wasn't entirely convinced that it did, then perhaps, yes, the painting from the parlor had morphed into a likeness of the Italian to lure him to a watery death...just so his grandson could be with a man he may or may not care for in more ways than one.

'Girly nonsense', Beilschmidt had declared of love, but Edelstein couldn't help but feel otherwise. He also couldn't help but feel a slight tug at his hand, as if Beilschmidt was trying to awake him from a daydream.

"I know you're dead over there, but you could at least answer me!" Beilschmidt teased. "I've been talking to you for the past five minutes," he exaggerated the actual length of time. "I asked if you ever wore jewelry, other than that cross." Beilschmidt pointed to the silver charm hanging from a delicate chain around Edelstein's neck. "I mean, I've got this old thing in my bedroom," he began, but soon realized his folly. "I mean...you can't have it or anything," he buried the mistake. "But uh, I guess what I mean is..." Too afraid to ask Edelstein if playing house meant they could play fake wedding, he halted the question, and changed the subject in an instant. "Ha, what a funny thing about your cross showing for all eternity, huh?" he blurted. "You don't even believe in Jesus!" he said, but winced, for the statement struck him as blasphemous. "Right? You said it was just for show...Edelstein, and all." And even saying the surname of his fellow ghost felt wrong on his tongue. “Wifey,” he jokingly called him, choosing a softer way to refer to his friend, remembering Edelstein had used the semi-matching nickname, 'husband', in the kitchen downstairs. "You in a trance or something??" he asked, due to gaining no response. Thinking surely a name such as 'wifey' would at least somewhat delight the romantic fool at his side; assuming he must be a romantic fool...'Musicians and artists and writers usually are,' Beilschmidt decided in his mind. "But anyway," he said, still fumbling and fiddling with Edelstein's hand, as if it were a toy -- soft and squishy and fun to pet, he thought it -- "I told you where I found the darn thing, so maybe now we can get on with my super secret sneaky plan??"

Edelstein smiled at this idea, which in turn caused Beilschmidt to sigh in relief.

\-- Yes! Finally some semblance of consciousness; proof of Edelstein paying attention to him...

But once glancing up to the ghost at his side, "The back porch," Edelstein said, as if answering a teacher's question in the middle of a class where he had almost fallen asleep. And of course, the teacher always calls upon the kids they assume are not listening, just to try and make a fool of them. Or so he felt, as he continued to respond in a sort of daze. "I didn't even know this house had a back porch..."

And upon slurring those words, he fought back a yawn. Not so sleepy, at least not in the usual or human sense, but after all, a man of habit is a man of habit, and it was indeed about time for Edelstein's nap.

"Yep," said Beilschmidt, shaking their shared grasp as if pleading with Edelstein to 'Come on, snap out of it!' Wanting his fellow ghost to wake up and play with him, God damn it. 'The day is still young! We have an adventure to go on, you idiot...I mean Wifey, I mean...'

Beilschmidt mentally kicked around these strange lines, while Edelstein laughed a faint laugh, then...

"I'm sorry," he said. "I must have..."

"Been thinking of how awesome I am for having remembered to check the back porch?" Beilschmidt interjected. "Yeah, I figured that ditzy guy stole my broom, and guess what? I have some very shocking news..." he announced, making the whole thing into something spectacular, when really, it was just dumb luck he had found it all.

Stomping one boot as he spoke, as if it all needed some sort of noise for emphasis, like a one-note drumroll; "I opened the back door..."

"Where is this back door??" Edelstein interrupted in an offended tone. "I never saw a back door!" 

"I was hiding it from you," Beilschmidt joked.

"A whole door?!"

"Yes, Wifey, a whole door..."

Beilschmidt leaned in close and whispered, "It was in the parlor, behind a magic panel. If you turn the lantern counterclockwise on the mantel, a panel falls down, and voila! Violas. Violins, there's the secret passage to my top secret back porch."

"Liar..." Edelstein feigned a hiss. Laughing as he shouted, "I don't believe you! Not for one second..."

"All right, fine then," Beilschmidt likewise pretended to fight, "have it your own way, Fussy Pants Wifey-Stein." 

"Wifey," Edelstein echoed the main gist of the childish nickname. "Of all the silly things...magic panels, and secret porches, and borrowed brooms," he huffed, a bit tired out from Beilschmidt's tomfoolery. "Yes, perhaps we should just get on with it."

Taking the hint, Beilschmidt let go of Edelstein's hand again, and floated on, sticking out his tongue at the broom as he passed over it. As if the poor lifeless creature had been hiding on the back porch of its own accord. As if the Italian hadn't swiped it, used it to clean his home, and then cowardly returned it fueled by the guilt of stealing. Money wasn't something the Italian had a lot of, but buying a new broom pained him, since -- for whatever strange reason -- a broom was a gift the Italian had once given to West; before his death, the Italian gave a push-broom to his lover as a Christmas gift. A war was on, so what else was he supposed to give? ' _To clean up our messes_ ,' the Italian had wrote upon a handmade Christmas card. Its cover drawn and decorated by the Italian himself. Little Christmas trees colored with soft green pastels. And the ornaments were glued on the trees; red-coated chocolate candies. A push-broom the most memorable gift he ever gave to West, so who could blame him if he didn't want to march down to the local hardware store -- the one Edelstein never found -- and buy a new broom to sweep his house? Nope, just borrow one from the neighboring ghost! At some point, though, the Italian had crept back to Beilschmidt's home, and propped the broom in a corner of the screened-in back porch. Wouldn't Edelstein be delighted when he discovered there was a swing back there?! Like a Norman Rockwell painting, or whatever it was he had dreamt of yesterday morning, while staring at the FRONT porch. The empty space...

_'The perfect spot to hang one.'_

But on the rear side of Beilschmidt's house, dangling from an overhang of the green sometimes-leaky roof, attached by two thick chains, there was a wooden swing already in place. The Italian was the only person who ever made good use of it. On lonely afternoons, he was likely to venture across the yard, once crawling through a hole in the fence -- too bad Edelstein never found that either; could have saved his nether regions from nearly getting impaled -- and with a cat in his arms, the Italian would swing back and forth, on the screened-in back porch. Wishing he could just have his own spare key to the Beilschmidt residence, but alas, the agent was adamant in never granting him that favor.

And so the Italian often found himself alone, parked in the swing, stroking his pet tabby cat at the back door. And no, the back door was never hidden. It was just in a place Edelstein had failed to check, either during his official tour of the house -- since he forwent viewing the entirety of the downstairs quarters -- or during his and Beilschmidt's roaming of the house, post-Edelstein's-death. But had he checked, he would have known there was a dining room downstairs, as well. Somewhere past the parlor, once turning the sharp corner near the kitchen, after traipsing down the hall from the starting point of the dusty foyer.

Still plenty of places left for Edelstein to explore, but for now, the older ghost had an agenda.

***

Near the far wall of the broom room, Beilschmidt hovered up to the ceiling. Despite knowing it was unneeded, he reached for a small iron fixture attached to a door amid the rafters, and pulled, causing a wooden ladder to unfold. “The third floor I never showed you,” Beilschmidt said, and wiggled his brows like he was about to unveil the grandest secret of his house. “Even your precious friend, the real estate rat, never saw all this!” he confided. “You want to go on a little treasure hunt with me, Wifey? Come on...float up here.” 

Edelstein grinned, thinking it a great change of pace from Beilschmidt’s stubborn demeanor downstairs, and from Edelstein's own bleak thoughts at the onset of their afternoon adventure. “All right,” he said, “but don’t think for one second I’ve forgotten about my plan. We’re going over to the Italian’s house as soon as we’re finished with this!” But his tone weakened; tossing out demands without thinking of how they’d affect anyone but him. “Or at least first thing tomorrow morning...” he added unconvinced.

“Uh-huh,” said Beilschmidt, as he ducked through the square-shaped doorway in the ceiling. Peeking past the wood frame of the opening with both hands on the top rung of the ladder. Only his face was seen, for his body was hid by the darkness of the attic space overhead. His legs stretched out behind him like a man hanging tight to the side of a ship lest he get carried away by a wave. “And have you thought about what the sight of you might do to him?” Beilschmidt asked, taking offense. “You think it’s easy for people to see their loved ones like this?? Knowing they’re dead. God, he’s probably crying over you right now. You can’t just traipse over there smiling like you’re invited for tea!”

“Well...” Edelstein hesitated while climbing the ladder, though he too realized it was unneeded. Knowing damn well he just could float to the ‘secret’ third floor, and join his fellow ghost for whatever game Captain Beilschmidt was playing; for whatever mode of cheering up he had in store. But Edelstein climbed, and he did it slow, for somehow, the newfound fun of levitating was lost on him, if only in that moment. Feeling far from weightless, “I haven’t thought about that, no,” he confessed in reference to Beilschmidt’s purposed outcome to the whole scenario. “But don’t you think he knows I’m here?” Edelstein asked. “Surely he realizes I’m...”

“Madly in love with me, and you have been since you were a kid, even though you always liked West better, blah blah blah,” Beilschmidt dismissed the probable backstory. “And a Catholic like our friend over there will just assume all men give up Heaven so they can stay in an old house with a ghost?!”

“He’ll know I did it for you,” Edelstein said, a note of sadness in his voice. “But I’m guessing no one did it for him...” And he stalled on the ladder. His gaze shot to the floor. “I didn’t know ghosts could get sick to their stomachs,” he said, touching his chest, and moaning a weak sound of discomfort. Peering back up to Beilschmidt as if hoping for an answer to a question he never asked. 

“Last time I checked, that’s your heart you’re touching, dumbass. And no, no one did it for our friend over there. My brother had more sense than I did! Why would he stay on earth with me, or with anyone?! I swear to God, you’re so stupid sometimes, for such a smart guy...” 

“And you’re so mean sometimes, I can’t stand it."

Edelstein choked out these words as his eyes welled with tears, yet he reached his hand to the next rung and the next. Climbing the ladder to see what Beilschmidt had in store for him. How else should he spend his first evening as a mere soul? The image of the men, if anyone were peeking in through the upstairs window, would appear to them like the whitish fog Edelstein often saw Beilschmidt as, but to each other -- the two ghosts -- they were still in full color; proper bodies in their eyes only -- and the pain in Edelstein’s chest seemed nothing short of human. A heart aching for the thought of the Italian unable to see his beloved; separated from each other. “But wait!” Edelstein said, and he stopped again, but only for a split second; resuming the climb, his steps quickened. “Are you saying your brother went to Heaven, or to...”

“He was a church-goer before the end,” Beilschmidt said. “You do the math.”

“So he’s in Heaven, and when the Italian dies, they’ll be together again!” Edelstein chimed. A tone akin to someone who had just watched the end of an old romantic movie. Gushing over the sentimental notion of two people being able to spend all eternity together in some far-off paradise. Well...not so far-off, as Edelstein had learned, if only from his brief moment of coming close to a band and the bright light which had tried to engulf him; whatever sights he saw and sounds he heard, and had later whispered about in bed. “It’s the same thing for you and me, but we just get it sooner! And this house isn’t Heaven,” he laughed, “like you said. Because best of all, we won’t have to share it.” He reached the top of the ladder, and smiled right into the deadpan face of Beilschmidt. “Don’t you think maybe...maybe that’s kinda sweet?”

Beilschmidt stared straight ahead at Edelstein, and narrowed his eyes, faking indifference; his lips coiled tight at one corner. “I think...” he began, as if struggling to phrase what Edelstein feared would be anger or annoyance. “I think it’s the sweetest thing anyone has ever done for me,” he said. “I think it’s the sweetest thing anyone could ever do for anyone,” and he let himself grin. “I think I told you this already,” he laughed, and rubbed his nose to Edelstein’s nose. “And if I didn’t, I meant to,” he admitted. “Now are you coming with me, or are you a coward?” 

To cap the question, Beilschmidt winked -- no longer a strange sight for Edelstein to see; at least now Beilschmidt’s eyes were no different than from when he was alive: full of color and something close enough to joy; akin to warmth -- and he leaned forward, if only his face, for his body remained in place. Sprawled out in the thin air of the dark attic space, as Edelstein clung to the wooden ladder.

A tear rolling down his cheek, and Captain Beilschmidt blew it away. 

“Now shut your eyes, and let’s see what happens,” Beilschmidt said in a purr or a whisper, or however he spoke when he wanted something more than ever. “Maybe we’ll both just dissolve. God probably doesn’t like it when ghosts get too friendly.” Rambling on, as if speaking into Edelstein’s mouth. Perhaps nervous; prattling nonsense; “Might shoot us with a bolt of lightning!” he suggested beneath his breath.

Soon his lips touched Edelstein’s lips, and he kissed him. 

Both closed their eyes, as Beilschmidt had directed, but within a few seconds, the sound akin to telephone static sounded throughout the house. The ghosts pulled away, mouths agape, but with Beilschmidt smiling. “Did you hear that?!” he asked, raising his voice over the final notes of the short-lived droning, “I think we found a new way to recharge ourselves!” 

He marveled at what he assumed was God’s reaction, then kissed Edelstein again. The sound repeated. Beilschmidt broke the kiss, this time by giggling. “I swear to God, Fussy Pants, it’s like an electric current.” 

Edelstein didn’t know what to make of the discovery. For the present moment, he wasn't all that concerned with the logic or science behind it, simply thinking how strange it was to be kissed by a ghost...and he himself a ghost! Repressing this morbid but lovesick line of thought, he playfully replied, “I guess when you need energy to appear and scare people, you can just come and find me."

“Come and find you, nothing,” Beilschmidt teased. “You and me, we’re gonna be inseparable. Haunting full-force and full-time!” he laughed. “Even I won’t get tired...no more drifting off to my grave. You just give your money away, like you said...give it all to our ditzy neighbor over there, and we can stay here being sweet 'til God says it's doomsday.” 

“Now that’s more like it,” Edelstein said, relieved over Beilschmidt finally agreeing to his plan. “But there’s still this secret floor you wanted to show me?” he asked, hoping to remind Beilschmidt of his own idea. The captain so easily sidetracked; prone to forgetfulness. Surely a bullet to the brain had nothing to do with his mind going blank on occasion. Maybe a kiss every day would not only keep him grounded in their home as a full-body apparition, but would also serve to sharpen his memory. A first name had to exist in there somewhere. To say nothing of the location of a key, although the whereabouts of that missing item no longer plagued him.

“Let’s see it then,” prompted Edelstein. Climbing towards the square opening in the ceiling as Beilschmidt turned away, disappearing into the darkness of the attic space. “I’m right behind you,” Edelstein said, and flew the remaining inches. Finding himself in a narrow hallway above the broom room. “It’s worse than the insides of a squashed shoebox!” he noted. “Can we really stand up straight?” 

“Just move like you’re swimming!” Beilschmidt told him, and Edelstein obeyed.

Lying out horizontal, like a surfer on a wave, Edelstein maneuvered his way to the end of the corridor. A heavy black-painted door with a padlock on its latch stood in the way of whatever Beilschmidt had kept hid those past eleven years.


	24. Chapter 24

In the darkness of the attic space, Edelstein discovered yet another curious thing. Despite the lack of light -- no overhead fixtures, no lamps, no candles, and only one boarded-up window -- he found he could see just fine. Like a cat in an alley at night, where any living man would be blind; eyesight akin to a nocturnal creature. The ghosts didn’t need sources of light; their paths illuminated by some force similar to reflection. When you shine a flashlight at a mirror, and it casts a spot of light onto a far-off wall. Or the way the sun reaches the moon, even with the Earth caught between the two. Beaming a secondhand light down to a body of water, and you see bits of it broken, shining in each drop of the ocean, and you wonder, ‘How does light travel so far without losing its intensity?’ Only scientists and God would know the answer, and as Edelstein once lamented, he was no scientist, only a violinist, and as for God knowing the answer -- all the answers -- now Edelstein would never have a chance to ask him. At least not in person. Never able to sit at God's feet, and peer up at him, and say, 'Why did all this happen? How does it work?? What does it all mean???' -- Ah well. Life’s mysteries, and why the moon and sun and ocean dance together like a love triangle for the ages was beyond his contemplation, when current riddles such as his ability to see straight ahead in a dark hallway without the aid of any outside forces was enough mystery for one day. Edelstein felt he was wearing night vision goggles, although without the typical tinge of a sickly green such goggles lend to a man’s vision. No, the path was clear, albeit the slightest bit shadowy. 

The narrow corridor punctuated by the heavy door. Edelstein faced it, and touched his bare feet to the floor. Standing on tiptoes, he lingered. “I suppose this is your big secret,” he said, and tilted his head, eyeing the padlock. “Whatever it is, it must be important.” Glancing over to Beilschmidt, he took a wild guess: “I don’t suppose my briefcase and other belongings are in there?” 

"Guess again, Fussy Pants," Beilschmidt said. "I mean, your briefcase is up here somewhere, but I took the deed to the house, and slid it under the door, so yeah, it's locked-in safe and sound," he laughed as if proud of himself, but looked about the shadows as if doubtful; wondering where in the hallway he had tossed the actual case. "The other stuff, though," he glanced back to his fellow ghost, "is down in that empty bedroom I told you not to go into." Flashing a quick grin, but his eyes seemed to hint towards an apology, like a puppy dog before he whimpers and leads you to a mess he made of something cherished. "That's the room West lived in while he was here. That one year..." And he trailed off a moment, running his hands to the fastened buttons of his Luftwaffe uniform before blurting, "I don't want you to sleep in there, or anything."

"Of course not," said Edelstein, and nearly whined, "I want to sleep with _you_."

The words sounding a bit too suggestive for such a dignified spirit, or so Edelstein feared, thus he shook his head 'no' and blushed in embarrassment. "In the same bed with you, I meant," he rushed out the clarification in a chaste tone.

Beilschmidt smiled, touched by the sentiment, though amused by the way Edelstein _first_ delivered it. "I knew what you meant, Wifey. Same as it would have been if..." and he wanted to say 'if you hadn't already died, damn it' but replaced the line with something he felt a million times more positive about: "It'll be just like last night, or...this morning, or...well, whenever you got back here." Hard to keep track of time when the clock in the parlor doesn't alert you of the hour, and each day, ever-passing, blurs into one night after another. Eleven years straight of having no reason to know the time of day, and for nearly a decade, having no way to tell it for sure. Just guessing it was almost sundown now. Just guessing it was almost time for the living men in this town to sit down to supper with their loved ones, then ready themselves for bed. What a nice way to pass an evening, Beilschmidt figured it must be, and for a quiet moment, he tried to picture himself in such a scene...in his future -- if a dead man even owns such a thing, and yes, Beilschmidt beamed at the unspoken thought, he and Edelstein DID have that, at least; no pulse or heartbeat, but a future? Most definitely! -- and they could both sit down in that unexplored dining room, and pretend to eat a whole feast. They could then wash up for bed in the narrow 'big' bathroom, where the king-sized tub was still filled with water. Where they'd never uncork the drain. Where they'd just peer down into it, on occasion, and think of bleaker things. Somehow, it later seemed to Edelstein, that pulling the plug from the drain would be like admitting defeat; he'd let it stay filled with water, and just hope for no mice to ever scurry over the tub's ledge. Never find a toy car to crash into it! Knowing how hard it is to hold your breath. How hard it is to escape from beneath the weight of water, massive compared to your own size. A small helpless creature...a mouse in a tub, or a man in a lake. And the older ghost knew how hard it is to enact a rescue mission when the weight of the water snuffs out your spirit; no way to swim nor save the drowning creature.

A great defeat, and a great loss for both of them. But in the initial years, it seemed to haunt Beilschmidt more than Edelstein, for the latter settled into his quiet existence; he wasn't mad, and he wasn't anywhere as close to disappointed as Beilschmidt had been.

Unable to save him...

Beilschmidt hadn't felt that useless since the last time his house was lived in.

The day his brother moved in -- late 1945 -- Beilschmidt never even had the guts, or maybe it was the heart he didn't have, to show himself as a ghost. Never stepping from the shadows, never appearing as the full-blown apparition, nor did he ever speak to West the way Beilschmidt had spoken to Edelstein: right off the bat to make his presence known. No, Beilschmidt never once manifested in the company of his little brother, because...why ruin his idea of him? Why render a perfectly good memory into something morbid?? For West to see his big strong soldier of a brother as a white fog floating about the house built by their grandfather, and hearing his older brother speak, voice drifting from the ceiling; a man so weightless and without form he can float through walls, it'd be as if Beilschmidt was never his strong flesh-and-blood brother at all. Just a vision imprinted, like a colorless photograph come to life. A colorless photograph taken by God the second Beilschmidt died, and so his image remained the same; dressed the way he died. Besides, West had the friendly neighbor to keep him company. The Italian living next door for one important reason. He had moved into that house after the war. To live right next door to the house West had inherited. And what a happy year the two of them spent there. As neighbors...friends...lovers, but they kept that last part confined to the Italian's house, away from the watchful eyes of a certain ghostly-grandfather whom West suspected was very much present in the parlor downstairs.

But West never guessed his brother was aloft in the attic. He also never paid much attention to his big brother's bedroom door always staying locked. In fact, West liked it that way; 'So no one ever goes in there and messes with his birds...Brother hated it when someone touched his birds.' Funny how Beilschmidt didn't seem to mind when Edelstein plucked one right from the dresser-top. Just to play with his little brother's old friend again...even if it meant having a treasured item thrown at his head! Whatever it takes to get a rise out of each other. Whatever needs to be done, in order to garner a response, and prove: if you're a tree falling in the woods, someone's around, thus you still make a sound.

So the attic was Beilschmidt's home for an entire year, while West slept in the first bedroom at the top of the stairs. Yet another room in which Edelstein had failed to set foot, either while on tour or while exploring. He'd get there eventually...the dining room, and to West's old bedroom. Yet now it appeared to be his room! At least for his things. "I put all your boxes in there," Beilschmidt explained. "And your violin is on the bed," he made sure to note with a serious nod of his head; well aware of how important the instrument was to his friend. "Ah, and your vast collection of underwear is in the closet," he snickered, for God knows Beilschmidt couldn't remain solemn for too long. "Ha, purple silk," he muttered to himself. "And that little jingle kitty," he said, and made a funny gesture with his hand, as if pawing at the chain which hung from Edelstein's neck; careful not to touch the actual cross. "You know, the one you cut the ribbon from so he wouldn't have his bell?" Beilschmidt smiled, but felt sorry for the plush cat unable to make a sound. "I dug him out from the bottom of a box, and placed him on a fluffy pillow. So now you'll have a cute little pet just waiting for you there! You can even play songs to him...give him a private concert, except not so private," Beilschmidt rambled on in a funny but sneaky voice, "because I think my little bird and I will come and watch."

"But you don't want me to sleep in there," Edelstein made sure, and meanwhile, his eyes shone bright at knowing his birth-year cat was safe on dry land. Not in the trunk of his car which would soon be towed to a salvage yard. The painting signed by Mrs. Edelstein never to be seen again.

Well, at least not by her son.

The next person to lay eyes on it would be a nondescript car enthusiast, looking for spare parts in the salvage yard. And once approaching a yellow vehicle and unlatching its trunk, 'Just what on earth is this?' he'd grumble to himself, but carry the painting home to give to his wife. Sure, the canvas wasn't blank; sure it still depicted two little boys on a hillside. And from her hands, his wife would pass it down to their kids, and surely, somewhere, in someone's happy, well-lit home, that painting is still displayed to this day. -- A cherished heirloom. Nice enough to be hung in a museum, they thought it, but that unknown family would never dare part with it. After all, _One man's trash is another man's treasure._ Not to say Edelstein ever deemed the painting as trash. He just...felt if it were gone -- and indeed it was -- maybe it was high time to be all right with that. West was but a fond memory now, and regardless, here stood the soul Edelstein had always wanted to be closer to. Always wanted to know. Always wanted to be looked at with more than just the unbridled disdain Beilschmidt had shown to him that childhood year.

"Nope. In the bed with me, Wifey," Beilschmidt smirked, stating yet again what Edelstein apparently needed to hear, but that devilish smirk pretty much canceled out any chastity Edelstein had hoped to bestow upon the action the two had already practiced -- the act the two had already taken part in that very day -- and were both more than ready to do, whether Edelstein was sleeping in the master bedroom as an actual living man for several decades, OR as a ghost lying in a bed alongside another ghost. "I just needed _somewhere_ to park all your junk," he said of his day-ago activity of dragging all the boxes to the second-story, and making his late brother's bedroom into a storage room for Edelstein's stuff. "An obstacle course, right? I couldn't let it stay so messy downstairs...and I knew you probably couldn't do it yourself, Mr. I'm So Tired."

"I suppose you're right," said Edelstein. "Thank you for that. But didn't you say my deed is in here?" he asked while motioning to the heavy door. "We'll need it, won't we?? Although I'm not sure if I can simply sign it over to our neighbor, or if he'll actually need to buy it for us himself, like we decided." Prattling about legal red tape and whatnot as he second-guessed his whole idea -- his lifelong practice -- of letting money solve most of his problems for him; glancing over to his fellow ghost with a worried stare. Getting nothing in return, at first, but a careless shrug.

"You'll have to ask that real estate rat," Beilschmidt finally said, and batted at the padlock with his fist. “I couldn’t find the damn key for anything,” he grumbled. "I thought you’d never get to see this place.” He punched at the lock a second time. “Ah, maybe in fifty years or something, but...” his tone brightened, as he returned Edelstein’s gaze, “now you can come right through the door! Easy as anything.”

“True,” said Edelstein, and he took a step forward before lifting his legs, to revert to floating. “I don’t suppose you ever thought of breaking the lock? Taking a crowbar to it, or an axe??” 

“Didn’t want to ruin it,” said Beilschmidt. “Besides, you know I can't find an axe. Plus, I didn’t have time! You only got here yesterday...I only thought of it during your nap...before you ran off to the lake,” he explained, though that last word felt out of place, thus he decided, right then and there, it should henceforth be stricken from their collective vocabulary. Wincing, he sort of laughed, “Or you know," while raising his hand, palm flat, “whatever happened, it happened before I could think of a Plan B. You come on inside now, though, all right?” 

Edelstein nodded in agreement, and drifted towards the heavy door. 

Once levitating past Beilschmidt, the two joined hands. 

“Let’s call this place our tree fort,” Beilschmidt grinned. 

“But it’s not in a tree at all!” reasoned Edelstein, yet he smiled, knowing the argument pointless. Resigned to mumbling, “You and your logic...”

On the other side of the door, the two ghosts ‘swam’, floating like mist on a breeze at a seaside. Unseen to the naked eye of a mouse named Herbert as he cuddled into a pile of old clothes in a far corner. A few moths batting their wings up near the low ceiling. And spiders in cobwebs couldn’t be bothered by the hand-in-hand duo who glided to the center of the room. The only 'proper' room in all of Beilschmidt’s beloved attic space; the remaining quarters found on the third floor of the captain’s house were mere alcoves filled with spare parts, such as shingles, wood beams, broken boards, a handful of nails, nuts and bolts leftover from various repairs, and splotches of water damage thanks to the leaky roof.

Ah, and hidden beneath a pile of oil-soaked rags: a briefcase filled with a small fortune. The two would come across it within the week.

But for now...in that one proper room -- as small as it was -- the most prominent feature was an old black-and-white train trunk with gold details and fixtures. Encircled by two straps made of leather, and a lock in front, yet the key to this particular lock was stuck right in its keyhole. Only a twist of the wrist was needed to open the trunk. Its hinges rusted. Its thick sides badly stained and battered, as if the trunk had seen several long voyages across the surrounding countries. 

“That’s my pride and joy,” said Beilschmidt, freeing his hand to point at the trunk. “My dad gave it to me when he died. He had it his whole life, too, and I think my parents even used it as a baby bed for me, back when they were poor.” 

“I hope they left the lid open,” joked Edelstein. 

He paced towards the trunk, and petted it.

“Needs repairs,” he noted, letting one finger rest in a deep indentation in the exterior. Rubbing his other hand to a jagged scratch; sniffing at the smell of the aged leather. “Might be worth a lot of money,” Edelstein said, “if cleaned up properly.” 

“That’s all you rich guys think about...how much money something is worth. You look at my old trunk and see dollar signs!” Beilschmidt sulked. 

“Is that what you were worried about?” Edelstein scoffed. He crossed his arms at his chest as Beilschmidt scuffed his boots at the dusty floorboards. “You thought someone would find it, and sell it, so you put a padlock on the door,” Edelstein surmised. “Well, the way it looks now, you couldn’t get spare change for it.” He turned up his nose, and shifted his weight, wishing his words would come out gentler; knowing he should lighten his tone; Beilschmidt was obviously proud of the damn thing. “I mean,” Edelstein struggled to rephrase, “I suppose if someone were in the market for such a thing, you MIGHT could get _some_ money for it, but...” he sighed, “unless there’s something valuable inside it, I doubt very much anyone would care to find this. Hardly worth hiding...” He finally managed to hush his critiques as he stepped closer to Beilschmidt, attempting to nudge his elbow into the ribs of his fellow ghost. “You’ve kept it up here, though, because you like it, and that’s all that matters, I suppose,” Edelstein spoke softer. “Tell me, Darling, what’s inside it?” 

“Darling,” Beilschmidt mocked, tossing the new pet name back at Edelstein. A snide little smile on his face. “Don’t try and sweet talk me now, Smart Guy,” he stated. “But if you want to know so bad, why don’t you go on and start digging?”

Edelstein huffed in exasperation, trying so hard to play along with his eternal mate, and yet all he could do was end up fighting; putting his foot in his mouth every other conversation. And most frustrating of all, Beilschmidt seemed to enjoy it! Ah well. “Whatever you say,” said Edelstein, and he knelt down to face the lock of the trunk. Turning the key, he lifted the lid, and the hinges creaked an awful moan. “Needs oil,” complained Edelstein, thinking out loud. “And Good God at all the stuff!” he said, gaping at the mound of belongings stashed inside. “How on earth do you expect to find what you’re looking for?” he asked. “You know...when you need something out of here??”

“I know exactly what’s in there,” said Beilschmidt, and he grinned, climbing to his knees to sit beside Edelstein. “You see, it’s a very brilliant system I’ve got, Fussy Pants. I’ve memorized all the contents, like I’ve got a camera in my head! I know what’s touching what, and what inch of the trunk holds what. It’s a great layout. Alphabetical order, you see.” And he lifted an apron from the front of the trunk; a pink frilly apron from the top of the mound. “My grandma’s,” he said, and handed the apron to Edelstein. “You might want to borrow it sometime,” he winked. “Ah! And here’s a bowler hat I stole from some guy who looked just like Charlie Chaplin!” Beilschmidt leaned in and whispered, “Maybe it was Charlie Chaplin, you know,” and he placed his finger beneath his nose to signify a toothbrush mustache. “No, let’s not do that. Never mind,” he laughed as if he had said something profane. “Maybe he was a fan of Chaplin,” Beilschmidt muttered in reference to an otherwise unmentionable dictator as Edelstein stared on, sitting with the apron on his lap, fiddling with the white rickrack embellishments along the apron’s lower hem. 

“I get your system now,” said Edelstein, a slight smile dawning as he leaned forward a bit. “A for apron, B for bowler,” he listed. “So what is C?”

“Chaplin,” teased Beilschmidt. “I always kinda liked Buster Keaton better, though.”

“Is he in this trunk?” Edelstein kidded in return. “I bet he would fit...”

“I want to fold you up, and see if you’ll fit!” Beilschmidt laughed. “No, I...I’m not sure what the C is...looks like a card from someone.” He lifted a yellowed sheet of paper, folded in half, and set it aside without reading it. “I think I know what it says," he downplayed, and checked to ensure the card was laid out of Edelstein’s reach. “You never want to reread those things, you know?” he spoke more in reference to himself. 

“An old love note?” Edelstein dared to ask. 

Beilschmidt stopped his rummaging a moment to cast an odd smile at Edelstein. “And who on earth would have sent ME a love note?” 

“Hmm,” Edelstein pretended to think. “Buster Keaton, perhaps?”

The two smirked at one another. Beilschmidt looking down at Edelstein, as the latter wilted from his kneeling position to sit flat upon the floor. Pawing at the apron as if petting a cat on his lap. Thinking maybe he WOULD wear the garment, sooner or later. Should Beilschmidt find the prospect of a man in an apron enticing, then why not.

“J...J,” chanted Beilschmidt. "Where’s the darn J...” 

The captain oblivious to Edelstein attempting to tie the apron around his waist. 

“I know I can’t take off my clothes, but can I add clothes to them?” Edelstein asked. “If so, I’m going to find my socks and boots as soon as we’re done up here!” 

Beilschmidt grumbled at the distraction, narrowing his eyes at Edelstein’s busy hands still fumbling with the strings of the apron. “I thought you were going over to our neighbor's house next,” said Beilschmidt, somewhat irritated. “And no, Fussy Pants, you can't put on anything else, now that you’re fixed like this.” 

“Fixed??” Edelstein asked, but received no audible answer. 

Instead, Beilschmidt illustrated it for him, by placing the bowler hat atop Edelstein’s head. It stayed there a moment, looking rather dapper, at least by British standards; Edelstein reminiscent of a silent film star: no one in particular, just the dark hair and sad eyes; pale skin suited best for black-and-white cinematography; a face fit for a close-up on the so-called big screen. 

“You’re too pretty...too pretty,” sighed Beilschmidt, and a split second later, the hat toppled from Edelstein’s head. “I knew it would,” Beilschmidt said, and he turned his attention back to the trunk. “I once tried to put on a pair of gloves because I always wore gloves back then, but I wasn’t wearing any that night,” he reminisced. “I wanted them back, so you know...I found a pair, and pulled them on, but after a minute on my fingers, they just floated to the floor.” He halted his digging long enough to admit, "That's why I can't give you that ring I thought of, either."

Edelstein picked up the bowler, and set it atop Beilschmidt’s head. Waiting a moment, he witnessed the same action: the hat fit perfect, though he hated how it hid Beilschmidt’s silver hair, then without reason, the hat fell. 

“Told you,” said Beilschmidt, and he plucked the bowler and tossed it back into the trunk. “So no, you can’t wear socks and shoes. I can’t wear gloves. Some guy who looks like Charlie Chaplin is running around without a hat, and the card was a death notice, Wise Guy. No one’s ever been in love with me. I don’t mind.” 

Edelstein managed to tie the apron, and he stood up to gain a better view of it, and of course to show it off. “Well, you know what I’d say right now if I didn’t think you’d scold me for it,” he said, while fussing with the strings; fluffing them into a bow. Hands positioned at the small of his back. “You seem quite adamant against me saying anything, despite our future needing it.” 

Beilschmidt held his breath, and perhaps his tongue. Turning to face Edelstein, he exhaled deep, sort of grumbling, but he smiled. “Little housewife I never had,” he said. His tone regretful, but his eyes shone as if amused. “Gonna right the wrongs, and put up curtains, and keep my attic room locked. Gonna sleep in my bed with me, and if anyone knocks on the door, we can just laugh at them, right? The house will be ours, and you’ll be my pretty little soulmate, I suppose.” He spoke on, contemplating their current situation, and also the years ahead.

After all, what would become of two ghosts?

As soon as the briefcase was found, the Italian would turn around, and buy the house, pay off his own house, give a bonus to the agent, and then, on a rather fun shopping spree, he'd buy a piano, a radio, and even a still-somewhat-newfangled device known as a TV. The two ghosts could stay awake at night, watching old movies they once saw in a theater. The Late Nite Picture Show: they could cozy up and watch those, and then stay awake long enough to glimpse the morning news. See Beilschmidt's homeland split in two. Be grateful the lakeside town was on the west side of a soon-to-be built wall, and of course they'd still be around when that wall came tumbling down. Dancing to 'Our House', by Madness, in the late 1980s to celebrate the positive change. No more Cold War...no more world wars. And all the way into modern day, they'd invite the Italian to come over, along with the so-called real estate rat, to watch football games. Calling them up on the telephone in true-to-ghost ways. Beilschmidt croaking out cryptic remarks in order to remind them of the date: 'Just two more days to the World Cup...show up if you know what's good for you,' then he'd wail, 'OooOooO,' just because he could, and pretend to rattle chains, thanks to a porch swing Edelstein indeed loved sitting in once he had found it. The living men arriving at the old house like coming home to a place they never lived in. Knowing the ghosts couldn't appear to them as full-body spirits, for they'd need all their energy to watch the game! So the agent and the Italian were happy to sit on a blanket in the parlor and sip wine as the two ghosts sat perched nearby in an oversized blue armchair. Edelstein snuggled atop Beilschmidt's lap, smiling like a wife amused by her husband just sniffing his beer. The Italian marveling over the floating bottle. The agent spooked. Both ghosts hoping not only for Germany to reign victorious on the playing field, but with heavy hearts, they also couldn't help but hope maybe they wouldn't be forgotten, even after the Italian and the agent passed away. Though both lived to be old men, one of them eventually settling down, after his mother was dead, but the other? Well, he didn't mind staying single. He knew Heaven was his, when he was ready...when it was his time. No longer tempted to drown himself in any body of water. Not after watching a man drown; a man who didn't want to die...a man he had prayed would resurface. At least he could grant him a favor, since he didn't have the courage to dive in and save him: the least he could do was spend Edelstein's money -- solving problems -- and even have Edelstein's songs published posthumously for him.

More importantly, though, with the house paid for, the two ghosts could always be together, and, for the most part, be left alone. A splendid situation for a former military man who often bragged about his isolation, as if he loved being single, and relished his lonesomeness while living. But after his death, the quiet got to him. Longing to hear a voice, laughter, footsteps. Wishing someone would move into his home -- a whole family, perhaps -- and fill it with warmth and light. And Edelstein had brought most of that to Beilschmidt’s home; his company, and his friendship. Even his love. But also his baggage. Remembering Beilschmidt for their past: it was a strange concept; one Beilschmidt had never counted on. A great prospect, though. To be remembered from his innocent days. To be playful again. To be thought of and looked at as some handsome guy Edelstein, for whatever reason, had admired back then.

“You wanted me to teach you something...” Beilschmidt said. 

The apron fell to the floor, just as soon as the bow was perfected. Edelstein glared down at the pink garment, and stomped his bare foot. Mouthing an obscenity before snapping out of his preoccupation with dressing the part of Beilschmidt’s feminine -- or at least more 'delicate' -- mate. “Teach me what exactly?” he asked.

“This,” replied Beilschmidt, tugging the item for J from the mound in the trunk. 

Edelstein’s face brightened. Flashing a wide smile, he stepped forward as Beilschmidt rose to standing.

Toe to toe, the two ghosts beamed at the item.

Edelstein reached out and touched it. “Your old jump rope!” he gushed.

“I saved it,” Beilschmidt said, careful to study Edelstein’s reaction. Speaking slow, as if hoping to make every word count for something he couldn’t say otherwise; wouldn’t let himself...for whatever reason. “I thought about throwing it away, once I got older, but you know,” he laughed, “I always looked at it, right before tossing it into the trash, and my mind would go back to you, Fussy Pants.” Beilschmidt took sole grasp of the jump rope -- gliding it from Edelstein’s hands -- and he slithered the frayed plaything through his fingers, draping it out lengthwise before stretching it across Edelstein’s shoulders, finally drawing the rope loose about Edelstein’s neck. Gentle movements, and a steady stare into the eyes of the only other man on earth who remembered the worn-out toy. A thoughtful tone, as Beilschmidt continued, “I knew West liked you, and I never could see why...until you asked me to teach you how to use this darn thing, the quick way, like soldiers do for exercise, and you came up to me with tears on your face,” he smiled. 

“I was scared of you!” Edelstein laughed. “Your brother had to convince me.” 

“I know that, too,” Beilschmidt said, inching closer. Tugging at the ends of the jump rope, but only in jest. Still not wanting to choke the ghost who stared back at him. “I remember thinking, ‘What is this kid? Some wimpy little brat?! A spoiled baby. A girly little pretty-faced guy wearing a damn cravat!!” 

“I guess I never changed,” Edelstein derided himself; his lifelong appearance; his outdated way of dressing, and his unabated haughtiness. 

“You never needed to,” said Beilschmidt. “I was a fourteen-year-old guy with some teary-eyed kid looking up to me like I was some king of a country! You were so scared, you were shaking, but ah, you opened your mouth, and you spoke to me like I was some peasant beneath you.” Beilschmidt imitated Edelstein as he had sounded that day at age seven: _"Show me how to use this thing!"_ He laughed upon ceasing the impression. “And then you damn near threw it at me! Crying the whole time, but you were such a snobby little guy...I never understood you.”

“Well...” Edelstein assumed of his behavior back then, “I wasn’t going to let you treat me like garbage, so I treated you bad first.” 

“And then you cried even harder when I threatened to make a noose,” Beilschmidt said. “You could dish it out, but you couldn’t take it. Called me an idiot. Pushed the rope at me, demanding I help you. No, you never changed, Fussy Pants. Same sharp tongue. Same sad eyes. Still wanting something from me, but you always keep your distance, like there’s a wall built between us because there has to be,” Beilschmidt shook his head. “Now that we’re both like this, and living here, you and I are equal, so there’s nothing left for me to give you.” 

“Well, what do you want to give me?” Edelstein asked. “You give me company. You've given me shelter in your home...” He reached out, and placed his hands on Beilschmidt’s arms, rubbing upwards but soon letting his grasp fall and settle to Beilschmidt’s waist. Wrapping his arms around him, while Beilschmidt held tight to the rope. “I think we have everything to give, and plenty of time to give it.” 

“Plenty of time, and a trunk full of goodies to play with,” teased Beilschmidt. “And when we’re finished with that, maybe we can get our neighbor to rent this place out to a family. You and I can sleep in this attic, and listen to the kids play downstairs. You can be my pretend little wife, and I’ll tell you every day how much prettier you are than anyone else who sets foot in your kitchen. And when you complain about the curtains they hang, I’ll nod and agree with you. We’ll get along fine, Fussy Pants. I know that. But you gave up something great. Something better than great! And all I can tell you is, I didn’t want it to be this way for you. I wanted you to live to be an old man. I wanted to watch you age. I wanted to point at you and make fun of your wrinkly face!” Beilschmidt laughed again, this time faint, and finally let his hands fall from the rope. “You’re just a soul now, and without a heart or a head, you think you can love, but...it hurts real bad, Fussy Pants. You’ll find that out. It sucks the air right out of you,” Beilschmidt advised as he diverted his stare to his boots. “It’s worse than when you’re alive. It’s worse than being a twenty-year-old guy, thinking ‘I can’t wait to get back home, and sit in my chair. Have that old man in the painting wink at me while I drink my coffee or beer. Go riffling through my trunk of keepsakes, and find that jump rope, and just what on earth ever happened to that friend West used to play with when we were kids?’ I figured you got killed in the war like I did,” he admitted. “You coming here made me happier than just seeing an old friend. It made me happier than finding a new one. It made me happy to see your face again. And now it’s mine to look at forever.” 

Beilschmidt lifted his gaze, returning it to Edelstein’s eyes, now hinting at tears. “The sound of your voice, and that violin...you need to get our neighbor to buy you some new strings with that fortune of yours,” Beilschmidt suggested. “He could even get us a record player, and we’ll play old songs, and dance, and...all this,” Beilschmidt looked about the room, “it could have been a prison I was pacing alone, but YOU,” he let go of the rope which fell to the floor, and he placed his hands on Edelstein’s arms, holding him in place but squeezing him as if fearful he'd float away. “You’re giving me the life I never knew I wanted. The future I never knew I missed. How the hell can I ever thank you for this?!” Beilschmidt’s voice went high-pitched, yet he calmed it in time to confess, "I can't, but...I love you, too, if that makes it worth it.”

Edelstein fell into the hug Beilschmidt created once releasing his hands; casting his arms around him instead. Edelstein still holding tight to the waistline of a dark war uniform. Nuzzling his face to Beilschmidt’s chest. Listening as his fellow ghost sniffled; his chin atop Edelstein’s shoulder. Whispering into his ear, over and over, a four-letter word, then mumbling something about the jump rope, a former threat, referring to the fact the first night in the house Edelstein had recollected of the incident -- their first and only prior meeting -- where Edelstein said Beilschmidt had wanted Edelstein to die, and now, Beilschmidt said he didn’t want it all. He had wanted Edelstein to live, and he hated what the move to Lakeside and Vine had brought to him. A Dead End. A premature demise thanks to a ghost and an image poorly translated. -- Edelstein listened to Beilschmidt’s ramblings and confessions, smiling only when the L-word was mentioned. Shushing him on occasion, but mostly Edelstein just patted at Beilschmidt’s back. Trying to bring him some ounce of comfort. Eleven years worth of loneliness, and eighteen years worth of longing and regret, built up then released thanks to a trunk unloaded to find the item marked J.

A keepsake.

A remembrance of an innocent time when two people met, and their fate was decided. 

Thrown together for all eternity, after losing their way for a while.

“Teach me now, then,” said Edelstein, after several minutes had passed. The sun setting outside Beilschmidt’s house. The Italian sitting on the front porch, too scared to knock. Crying with his head in his hands. The real estate agent lurking around the corner in the driver’s seat of his car. In the passenger seat, a bouquet of roses. Tempted to drive to the lake, and toss the flowers into the water. Or he thought, perhaps, he’d drive to the house, and set them on the doormat. -- Joke was on him; Edelstein never got a chance to buy that doormat. All the real estate agent would find to welcome him was an Italian: the only man on earth with more tears in his eyes than the ghost of Captain Beilschmidt.

Crying came natural to the Italian, for he was an emotional guy; a passionate romantic, but...it was once noted by a fellow soldier, Beilschmidt was the type of man who could laugh and cry at the drop of a hat. 

Perhaps a bowler, stolen from a man who looked like Chaplin. Lying atop the mound in the opened trunk where, as a baby, Beilschmidt slept. 

And beside their feet, the jump rope laid sprawled out like a murdered snake. Along with the apron: its strings flailed to either side, like it was screaming for help; a victim shot, then outlined in pink chalk at a crime scene. -- All the eerie sights and sounds in a haunted house forgotten and blocked out thanks to the souls of two men who went to their graves pining over memories, longing to right wrongs, and hold in their arms the one they never had a chance to grow-up with and hold while alive.

An eternity to be content with rooms in need of dusting. With artifacts alphabetized, and all the stories attached to them. With parlors not worth entering. With pictures on the wall, and uncovered mirrors. A clock the two might eventually restart. To hear the cuckoo call to them every hour of the day and night. To have Beilschmidt build fires, and light candles. To have Edelstein bake, or even prepare those damn blessed pancakes!! Yes. A life of quiet normalcy for the two souls in the attic space. A door locked behind them, and no key needed. A love between hearts no longer beating. An endless play-date to replace the stricter fates they'd forgone.

Heaven: a destination unneeded. 

Hell ignored.

Beilschmidt eased from the hug, and bent over, lifting the rope from the floor. 

“I’ll teach you,” he said, “but you gotta pay close attention. It’s a little bit tricky.” 

“I’m listening,” said Edelstein. “We have more than a lifetime. Take it slow.”


End file.
